NinSheetMusic Forums

While working on the "Unofficial Pokémon Gold/Silver Replacement (http://forum.ninsheetmusic.org/index.php?topic=7327.msg299174#msg299174)" Project, I raised a concern about how the games should be organized. This my original post on the matter (http://forum.ninsheetmusic.org/index.php?topic=7327.msg299310#msg299310). Basically, I believe that our current system of organizing the songs from Pokémon games is inefficient, even to the point of being confusing for both arrangers and readers.

A short history of Pokémon games

To fully understand my concern, you need to know the history of Pokémon games. I'm not talking about lore; I'm referring to the actual release dates of the games. Pokémon Blue and Pokémon Red came out in 1996. Yellow followed in 1998. Pokémon Gold and Pokémon Silver came out in. 1999. Pokémon Crystal came out in 2000. Ruby and Sapphire came out in 2002. Emerald came out in 2004. Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time and PMD: Explorers of Darkness came out in 2007. PMD: Explorers of Sky was released in 2009.

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As shown by the history, each generation of Pokémon games comes out in a duo. Each initial set of games, music-wise, is the exact same. I'm not aware of any songs found in Blue that are not found in Red, for example, or songs found in Ruby that are not found in Sapphire. However, the same cannot be said for the third game in each generation. There are songs found in Yellow that are not found in either Red or Blue. One example on the site include  "Opening (Yellow)." Arrangers have been working on different songs exclusive to Yellow in the "Fixing Red/Blue Pokémon" Project (http://forum.ninsheetmusic.org/index.php?topic=5732.msg220777#msg220777)." These include "Jessie and James Appear" and "Printer Error." The same can be said for the "Unofficial Pokémon Gold/Silver (http://forum.ninsheetmusic.org/index.php?topic=7327.msg299174#msg299174)" Project. According to Latios, the songs "Defend Globe," "Sky Peak Final Pass," "Spacial Cliffs," "Team Charm's Theme," and "Splinda Cafe (Duet)" are all found exclusively in Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Sky. Most of these songs show this uniqueness by listing PMD: EoS exclusively as its game, and 2009 as its copyright year. But, there is some confusion there, even in the songs that are already on the site. Some songs list "2007-2009" as its year. The majority pick one of the years and uses that. In the end, it's not consistent and it's incredibly confusing.

My solution: list the third game in each generation as a separate game. So it would be "Pokémon Yellow" and "Pokémon Blue & Pokémon Red." Two separate categories on the site. Only songs found exclusively in "Pokémon Yellow" would be included there. Every other song goes in "Pokémon Blue & Pokémon Red." My reasoning is that Pewter City (random example) wasn't copyrighted in 1998; it was copyrighted in 1996. Listing it again under Yellow would be redundant and inaccurate. So it would belong to the former games, and not in the later game.
And, for the sake of consistency, I recommend that we list each individual duo alphabetically. Like so:

Consistency!

Pokémon Blue & Pokémon Red
Pokémon Gold & Pokémon Silver
Pokémon Ruby & Pokémon Sapphire
Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Darkness & Pokémon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time

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If something is going to be done about this, it needs to happen now. Before these projects fully complete. It will be incredibly more difficult to fix this if we wait until both projects are done.

Of course, I may be entirely wrong. If it's decided that our current system is fine, then I'm fine with that as well. But if we decide to go ahead with my plan (or choose a new, different one entirely), I will personally participate in the project. Or lead it, if necessary. Although most of the work has already been done by Latios anyway. :)

Comments/Questions/Concerns/Suggestions?

I'll post my thoughts when I get back onto a computer.

This has been said before, but there's an inherent problem.
Say someone has only played Yellow. They don't know that it's the same as Red/Blue, so they give up when they can't find the sheets from the game they were looking for.
Basically, while it is our goal not to get duplicates on the site, it becomes a pain for the casual user if we would split up the 3rd game from the other 2.

That does not happen. Brawler is completely correct. We don't list the Mario Bros. theme as being from every game it appears in, especially now as more and more Mario music is reused (see: NSMB series, the soundtracks for which are nearly identical for each, and in the case of Wii and 2, completely identical minus slightly instrumentation changes).

I've been of this exact opinion for a while, and I think I said so in that arrangement project thread, but the way we have it is inherently incorrect--the categorizations only make sense in retrospect. If something equivalent to Pokémon Z came out this year and used 70% of the music from X & Y, we wouldn't edit the existing sheets to read "X, Y, and Z." It's the same for Black 2 and White 2, which includes almost the entire Black & White soundtrack in addition to a large new soundtrack. We need to fix this.

My thoughts:

Separating the games into "Pokémon Red & Blue" and "Pokémon Yellow", and the same for the rest of the series:

Arguments Pro:

-Makes sense separating the songs that are exclusive to yellow, since they only appeared there and where made exclusively for Pokémon Yellow.
-Year, makes also sense with the game being released years after the first two.

Arguments against:

-The songs in Red & Blue also occurs in Yellow, so separating the game makes no sense.
-Too few songs? unnecessary? 
-As Maelstrom said, someone might only have played Pokémon yellow.

I'm pro separating them. Especially if the later black & white 2 has a great amount of exclusive song for the games, not like yellow which only have a few songs exclusive for the game.

What Maelstrom said however might be an issue in other games with less obvious connection. The pokémon games is well known among people to comes as a trio, or if you wish a duo+another game a couple years later. But let's take Zelda as an example. The Overworld theme from Link's Awakening is the same as the one in Oracle of Seasons & Oracle of Ages. In this case some person visiting the site might only have play Oracle of Seasons and might not find the sheet so easily because he didn't know that it was the same as Link's Awakening, which it is listed under.

This Zelda one is just one example of this, there are many other examples of this.

Perhaps the sheets themselves can read "Pokémon Red and Pokémon Blue Versions" (or w/e we decide to do) but the site header can read Red/Blue/Yellow, and then a separate section for Yellow called like "Pokémon Yellow (exclusive)" or something?

Is there something wrong with each game having its own soundtrack separately

Quote from: NocturneOfShadow on July 31, 2015, 03:53:42 PMIs there something wrong with each game having its own soundtrack separately

Red and Blue share a soundtrack (http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Game_Boy:_Entire_Pok%C3%A9mon_Sounds_Collection_CD).

So they can be together... but I mean just relisting the songs that were in multiple games

Quote from: Altissimo on July 31, 2015, 03:36:29 PMPerhaps the sheets themselves can read "Pokémon Red and Pokémon Blue Versions" (or w/e we decide to do) but the site header can read Red/Blue/Yellow, and then a separate section for Yellow called like "Pokémon Yellow (exclusive)" or something?

In all honesty, I would consider this the best case scenario. Pokemon Ruby and Sapphire would be near the bottom of the page, but Pokemon Emerald would be near the top. I would be completely satisfied if each third game could get its own category under the other two. The problem is that there is no precedent for this; no other section of the site has this setup. Is it even possible, from a technical standpoint?

I've also added a poll for the thread.

Yes, this is the best idea. Having a sub-category within each gen would be the best, if it's not too hard for an admin to program.

Otherwise I don't have too much of a preference as long as it's consistent (i.e. BW2 having its own section right now when nothing else does bothers me). Yes, B/W2 has its own separate OST technically but most of the songs are carried over from B/W directly, and furthermore, the B/W2 soundtrack just tosses together a bunch of tracks from the third games anyway. (It may as well have been labeled B/W2/Emerald/Platinum OST). In summary, if we can't do the subcategory thing, either combine for all the gens or separate for all the gens.

Also, would it be possible for the default main site setting to be chronological? I've always found it counterintuitive, illogical, and arbitrary for games to be listed in alphabetical order within each section (seriously, why is My Pokémon Ranch at the top?). This would remove any issues with Ruby/Sapphire being separated from Emerald, etc.

Quote from: Latios212 on August 03, 2015, 11:04:33 AMYes, this is the best idea. Having a sub-category within each gen would be the best, if it's not too hard for an admin to program.

Otherwise I don't have too much of a preference as long as it's consistent (i.e. BW2 having its own section right now when nothing else does bothers me). Yes, B/W2 has its own separate OST technically but most of the songs are carried over from B/W directly, and furthermore, the B/W2 soundtrack just tosses together a bunch of tracks from the third games anyway. (It may as well have been labeled B/W2/Emerald/Platinum OST). In summary, if we can't do the subcategory thing, either combine for all the gens or separate for all the gens.

Also, would it be possible for the default main site setting to be chronological? I've always found it counterintuitive, illogical, and arbitrary for games to be listed in alphabetical order within each section (seriously, why is My Pokémon Ranch at the top?). This would remove any issues with Ruby/Sapphire being separated from Emerald, etc.

In regard to Black 2 and White 2, the first three discs of its album (124 tracks) are original, with only the last disc (49 tracks) being from Emerald and Platinum. So that is a pretty good size original soundtrack.

Yeah I get your point. I guess what bothers me is that it isn't a standalone soundtrack like the others, so it feels like it should be nested with the B/W one.

Is now a good time to bring up the ordering problem with the Zelda section

Quote from: Latios212 on August 03, 2015, 11:04:33 AMAlso, would it be possible for the default main site setting to be chronological? I've always found it counterintuitive, illogical, and arbitrary for games to be listed in alphabetical order within each section (seriously, why is My Pokémon Ranch at the top?). This would remove any issues with Ruby/Sapphire being separated from Emerald, etc.

If it were me, I'd put all the main games under a header like "Main Series Games" in chronological order, then everything else in a header like "Spin-off Games" that keeps sub-series (Colosseum/XD, Mystery Dungeon, Stadium, Ranger, etc) together in chronological date by first spin-off release, finally followed by one-off spin-off games. I would even put it like this for the "Other" section of the site, with all series being kept together in alphabetical order, then all one-off games being together in alphabetical order. This is just me, though.

Quote from: NocturneOfShadow on August 03, 2015, 01:02:33 PMIs now a good time to bring up the ordering problem with the Zelda section

What's wrong with it.

We had this discussion in the Red/Blue project and we basically decided to just label the 3rd game tracks with "(Yellow)" or "(Yellow Version)" where applicable. It looks great and works very nicely. Why not just use the same system for the others too? I love consistency.

Completely disagree, even though there are only a few tracks exclusive to Yellow, they are not in Red and Blue at all and shouldn't be treated as the same game. This is an especially bad way to handle things for, say, Platinum, which has 30+ exclusive tracks, or Black 2 and White 2, which has well over 100.

Quote from: SlowPokemon on August 05, 2015, 01:34:15 PMCompletely disagree, even though there are only a few tracks exclusive to Yellow, they are not in Red and Blue at all and shouldn't be treated as the same game. This is an especially bad way to handle things for, say, Platinum, which has 30+ exclusive tracks, or Black 2 and White 2, which has well over 100.

Alright point taken. Then my vote would be for splitting the 3rd games apart.

Quote from: Maelstrom on August 03, 2015, 04:27:59 PMWhat's wrong with it.

They use "The" when alphabetizing.  That's not right

Which would (rightfully) place it in the "L" section. I volunteered at a library a couple weeks ago and ran into this issue, and was taught to categorize something like this as "Legend of Zelda, the" and so on.

not only that, but Minish Cap is underneath the likes of Ocarina of Time

I've heard from Latios, but I would like to hear the opinions of the rest of the staff, since this decision entirely rests upon them. As far as the poll goes:

Spoiler

5 votes are unanimous in favor of my proposal, as of this post.

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To summarize my idea:
1) The first two games in each generation of Pokemon games would be a combined game. As far as I've seen, they always share the same soundtrack.
2) The third game would only include songs exclusive to that game; repeats would belong to the prior games in that generation.
3) Every other suggestion is up for debate and discussion. My main idea rests entirely on the first two points; everything else is based around the optimization of these two central ideas.

Nice job explaining, but I think it's important to clarify that in the events where the remake includes a *remix* of a track, and you base your arrangement on the remix, not the original, it should fall under the remake. Seems obvious, but if you base your arrangement of "Battle! (Trainer Battle)" on the version in Black 2 & White 2, rather than the (very similar) version in Black & White, it might be confusing for some to know that it should be filed under the Black 2 & White 2 section. I hope that makes sense.

Quote from: Brawler4Ever on August 09, 2015, 10:11:33 PMTo summarize my idea:
1) The first two games in each generation of Pokemon games would be a combined game. As far as I've seen, they always share the same soundtrack.
2) The third game would only include songs exclusive to that game; repeats would belong to the prior games in that generation.

Quote from: SlowPokemon on August 10, 2015, 08:28:58 AMNice job explaining, but I think it's important to clarify that in the events where the remake includes a *remix* of a track, and you base your arrangement on the remix, not the original, it should fall under the remake. Seems obvious, but if you base your arrangement of "Battle! (Trainer Battle)" on the version in Black 2 & White 2, rather than the (very similar) version in Black & White, it might be confusing for some to know that it should be filed under the Black 2 & White 2 section. I hope that makes sense.

Yes. These two things and then we're all set. Let's implement them both together cuz that takes care of everything and exactly the way it should be done.

How are we thinking the titles should be represented on the sheets? "Pokémon Gold Version and Pokémon Silver Version", like Latios212 is trying to make the standard in the GSC arrangement project?

Also, what of the RBY tracks - Red and Blue, or Red and Green?

Quote from: Brawler4Ever on August 09, 2015, 10:11:33 PM1) The first two games in each generation of Pokemon games would be a combined game. As far as I've seen, they always share the same soundtrack.

There are a couple of exceptions (ex, Opelucid City from B/W) but it's fine since the OSTs combine the games and the other 99% of tracks are shared.

Quote from: Altissimo on August 10, 2015, 03:05:41 PMHow are we thinking the titles should be represented on the sheets? "Pokémon Gold Version and Pokémon Silver Version", like Latios212 is trying to make the standard in the GSC arrangement project?

Also, what of the RBY tracks - Red and Blue, or Red and Green?

Errr, we already did Pokémon Red/Blue Version for gen 1 project but either should work. As long as it includes only the paired games and the word "version". And North American titles, correct? So Red and Blue.

Quote from: JDMEK5 on August 10, 2015, 02:54:20 PMYes. These two things and then we're all set. Let's implement them both together cuz that takes care of everything and exactly the way it should be done.

Gotta get Jamaha. He's the only one who can edit site category titles.

I know it's wordy, but unfortunately if we want to be accurate it should be as follows:
Pokémon Red Version & Pokémon Blue Version
Pokémon Yellow Version
etc.
Pokémon Black Version 2 & Pokémon White Version 2
and then starting with the 3DS games, "version" is eliminated from the title:
Pokémon X & Pokémon Y
Pokémon Omega Ruby & Pokémon Alpha Sapphire

Worth noting that the first two hybrid word games are written as a single word with two capitalizations, without a space, as follows:
Pokémon FireRed Version & Pokémon LeafGreen Version
Pokémon HeartGold Version & Pokémon SoulSilver Version

Writing it as Red/Blue Version or Red & Blue Version implies that the first game is called Red with the second being called Blue Version. According to grammar, the way I suggested is appropriate.

Yeah, but they're all "Pokémon [something] Version." It makes sense to use the shortened "Pokémon Red/Blue Versions" scheme, for example.

Besides everything from XY forward omitting the version, I don't think you caught my edit:

Quote from: SlowPokemon on August 10, 2015, 04:18:48 PMWriting it as Red/Blue Version or Red & Blue Version implies that the first game is called Red with the second being called Blue Version. According to grammar, the way I suggested is appropriate.

It's my opinions that the "/" character also looks unprofessional IMO, especially considering that all official Game Freak sources including the soundtrack albums use "&" instead. And "Red/Blue Versions" is just a clunky way of putting it.

we could do Red & Blue or Red-Blue or Red_Blue_versions or Red||Blue

Red %%%Blue

The word "Version" is part of the actual title of the game, as seen here (http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Pok%C3%A9mon_Emerald_Version) and here (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pok%C3%A9mon_Gold_and_Silver).

So we could put "Pokemon Red Version & Blue Version." Or "Pokemon Red Version/Blue Version". I don't think that it matters, as long as it's consistent.

in that case Pokémon would be part of the title too and slow is completely correct

Quote from: SlowPokemon on August 10, 2015, 04:18:48 PMI know it's wordy, but unfortunately if we want to be accurate it should be as follows:
Pokémon Red Version & Pokémon Blue Version
Pokémon Yellow Version
etc.
Pokémon Black Version 2 & Pokémon White Version 2
and then starting with the 3DS games, "version" is eliminated from the title:
Pokémon X & Pokémon Y
Pokémon Omega Ruby & Pokémon Alpha Sapphire

Worth noting that the first two hybrid word games are written as a single word with two capitalizations, without a space, as follows:
Pokémon FireRed Version & Pokémon LeafGreen Version
Pokémon HeartGold Version & Pokémon SoulSilver Version

Writing it as Red/Blue Version or Red & Blue Version implies that the first game is called Red with the second being called Blue Version. According to grammar, the way I suggested is appropriate.

First of I thought that this was unnecessary finical, but then I noticed that there are few games where there are any ambiguity about what the game title should be, most games have straight-forward titles. So I think this is a good idea and that we should make it perfect and consistent.

Site sections all fixed. Thanks Jamaha!

As for the sheets... We'll get to them as we replace them, I suppose.