h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hi, and welcome to H2G2! (I'm not particularly 'old' on here myself, but I've been around a while - slightly over eight months actually (blimey, I've only just realised it's that long)). I don't know how much you know about the way entries work on here; I'll assume you know what I know, and if there's something you don't understand just ask.

Always good to see new gamers on here, and especially Final Fantasy players. As RFJS (U524615) said, it's a little unlikely that we'll get any more entries through to the Edited Guide about the series. We were picking up a certain amount of criticism (and an awful lot of being completely ignored) for trying to get an entry through as long as mine about "a mere series of computer games". Regardless of the complete lack of fairness involved (have a look at some of the other really long entries like the Simpsons one - that's "just about a TV series"), we can't really avoid this general feeling and hence it would be difficult to get anything else through. Especially seing as it took pretty much the full 8 months I've been here to get mine through, although the first couple of months of that it wasn't very good.

However, there's always the Unedited Guide, which requires no interest, but allows any users to pick up important info on the things that really matter - such as FF games . Personally, I simply haven't got around to doing anything on any of the other entries, IX or otherwise, and as such it would certainly be selfish and unhelpful, and even Godfather-like to say I was planning to do the FFVIII entry and no-one else should do one that would be incorporated into the group RFJS and I are planning to produce. Therefore, feel free to begin writing one if you wish.

On the other hand, you did talk about helping, rather than writing. If that's all you want to do...well, I may get around to starting one sometime soon, especially as I'm probably going to be replaying it in the near future, in which case any comments are of course more than welcome.

Or, if you'd prefer, there's the option for multiple people to work on the same entry (I think), and it could be a collaberative effort. You're welcome to decide, based on how much time and work you want to put into it - especially seeing as we would not (at first, at least) be looking at getting it Edited.

Welcome once again, and I hope I haven't innundated you with stuff immediately. Your final option is, of course, to tell the mad raving fanatical loony (namely me) to go away and waste his own time writing entries.

*Another mad raving fanatical loony wanders in.*

I'd previously thought that FF8 would be one of the easier ones to cover, but having looked at some of the stuff on GameFAQs I suspect that it could prove one to the trickier ones to get right. Square focussed quite heavily on the love story aspect, and so some of the details of the world mechanics were left vague even by FF standards. Although that doesn't become evident until later in the game, so maybe it could be avoided.

Given that LQ has all the joys of A-levels, and I have some frightfully long bus journeys to and from lectures this year, our work rate isn't great, so you wouldn't need to rush to finish FF8. I did some preliminary research about a week ago, but all I actually wrote was little more than one paragraph, so it could easily be given to another writer, or written (as well as researched) by multiple people. I have more free time than LQ; we don't know about you yet...

Of course, if you don't feel like devoting a substantial section of your life to FF8 Entry development, we can just notify you when there's something ready for you to look at and you can comment on it.


Regarding the unlikelihood of getting Entries on specific FF games into the Edited Guide -- I ought to say in partial defence of the general feeling that doing so would create a substantial imbalance. C800 contains fifty-something Entries at present, and in the RPG genre alone there are plenty of unrepresented series -- SaGa, Dragon Quest, Lunar, Grandia, Breath of Fire, Ys, Phantasy Star... I could go on. So it's not just a general lack of passion for FF, although certainly some categories _are_ more equal than others.

There is also the small matter that I, even more than LQ, like the sort of theoretical delving that goes on in fandom -- plot theories, attempts to work out where characters' names were derived from, etc. Not everyone is convinced that hitchhikers are interested in that sort of thing. (I was once told, pretty bluntly, that 'the sort of audience we have here for the Edited Guide' wouldn't be prepared to read past the ~2,000th word.) Although personally I think it's a shame to assume that practically everyone is happy being normal, and consequently to deny people the chance to fall into the joys of deranged dom... (My Entries don't even use only Approved GuideML anymore, and I am rather enjoying the editorial freedom of the unedited Guide...)


Well, that's my attempt to scare you off. As you can see, we're perfectly sane humans apart from being obsessively determined to provide information of FF for passing hitchhikers.

Well, I don't know how much writing I'll be able to do. I could research and give you some information, and I could look over any entry you make.

If you need me to though, I could write the entry. Either way, I'll be happy to help make the Guide complete.

There's no rush, so don't spoil the unfolding plot for yourself on the Guide's account.

I may manage to put something together in the near-to-medium term... Then again, I may get sidetracked by real life and the essays it contains. But we don't need to work anything out right now.

Well, now that there's a fair amount of momentum behind an FF8 Entry, I've decided to start one, and upload it in stages for comment rather than write it all before uploading (see also F1805234?thread=563117&post=6382696#p6382696 ). A3505411 currently has only a few paragraphs, but feel free to comment as it grows (hopefully at a reasonable pace).

It's grown quite a bit, although it's still in the main writing phase. I'm posting notification to the thread I linked to above when I update it.