#musicbrainz

<11muxxer.exe> But moderating that would be a huge issue, as in, think of MBz already; it's hard to moderate people adding wrong releases to bands, adding wrong metadata and such. Videogames often fall into a gray area, like, say some dude posted an unfinished demo for some extremely basic asset flip; should that be included onto the database? When I try to think of it, it becomes a problem, and if you were to moderate and curate

what gets onto the site, it'd take an eternity of checking through endless queues of additions.

<11muxxer.exe> One would have to think that through

i don't see a problem with having an asset flip in the database if someone cares enough to enter it

it's still a game, right? MB doesn't care if the music in the database is actually any good or not

i could see the challenge

i guess the question is .... to what end?

like, when is the db being called up?

rather than what it contains or where that comes from, what it is called up for/by is sort of your answer for why it might have cause to exist

in turn, that gives you a sense of if it's viable

or how to define "Viable"

<11muxxer.exe> I mean, I think that the thing with such a database would be having to manage its scope. You can just have it to list individual games, say: Assassin's Creed 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Battlefield 3 and so on, and add some relationships such as an official site, or stores where it is sold, as well as relationships with developers/publishers and consoles it was released for.

<11muxxer.exe> But then one can think that such scope is too limited.

<11muxxer.exe> Why not add relationships for people who work in the game? After all, they show up in the credits, and in the case of MBz, we already have relationships for even rather menial roles in the production of an album.

well, similarly, if you can figure out why such a database would be called up

or who would be accessing it for a purpose ...

sure, everyone listed in the credits screen should be in the database, otherwise what's the point?

those questions would describe to you what data might be useful, in addition to viability

it's actually quite useful to be able to look up (for example) who did the voice acting for some random side quest NPC in a game

right now i use imdb for that, but imdb is a proprietary database

<11muxxer.exe> And then you kinda have to think: what defines an entry? For instance, Splinter Cell: Double Agent has two different releases, two different games under the same name, do you create a different entry for each? And then I think of cases like visual novels or certain other games. For an example, Clannad has over a dozen different releases; some with voice acting, some without, some in different languages, some with just

relatively small differences which are more on the technical side, so do you create subentries for these? I mean, personally I'd say "yes", but from a point of view of using, contributing and maintaining the site, it'd be quite an issue.

<11muxxer.exe> Although I'd honestly like to just copy VNDB's relationships, in a way.

"two different games under the same name" sounds more or less exactly like an MB release group

yeah

<11muxxer.exe> Of course, but the thing is that two different games under the same name aren't the same as a release group, they're be more like two different release groups which share the same cover art and perhaps some recordings, but which are otherwise different in their content. Double Agent on the PS2 has a different plot and slightly different gameplay than the 6th gen and PC versions, and we'd have to think of a game as a

release group, and its releases as the different versions for the game.

that's not different to MB release groups, there are many albums which have different content. "a different plot" doesn't seem materially different from different tracks on an album

<11muxxer.exe> Which again brings up the question of how do you determine different versions, because technically speaking, a game released for the PS2 and PC can be exactly the same in most aspects, but at a technical level they'll differ; for instance, the PS2 game has a 480p resolution and only runs at 30 FPS, while the PC version maybe goes up to 1080p and has no frame limit.

and of course if there are two completely different games that happen to share the same name, you could just add them as separate release groups

i can't possibly imagine why you would think 480p vs 1080p would be anything other than a different release in the same group, tbh

<11muxxer.exe> Yeah, but the content of the game is still different, in fact, these games are often developed by other developers. Personally I'd say that if the difference between one version and the other is substantial, then each should have its own entry.

i'd say ps2 and pc are comparable to cd vs vinyl vs digital

that's again not different from a high-fidelity CD being in the same release group as low-fidelity vinyl or cassette release

Erin: jinx!

<11muxxer.exe> I meant it as having them as different releases within the same release group.

i was faster so nyaaaaaa

it might also ahve different metadata

different publishers or studio associations or something

so i could see it

<11muxxer.exe> I mean, the digital and CD versions of an album might be the same, but they're different releases, right? Games, on the other hand, are somewhat different, because at a technical level, the same game will have differences between different consoles, so that's why I wonder if each version should have its own entry or if one entry should hold multiple console relationships, you know.

yeah, MB basically handles all this stuff already for music... trivial to have multiple release of the same release group with different publishers... there might be some edge cases you need to work out for games but i see no actual issues here

<11muxxer.exe> VNDB has an individual entry for each release of a game

"the digital and CD versions of an album might be the same, but they're different releases, right?" - no, digital version might include extra tracks that couldn't fit on the CD, same like a PC game might include extra content that couldn't fit in the PS2 release

MB doesn't specify that two releases in a release group are "the same" in any meaningful sense

<11muxxer.exe> Which means that it has a unique entry for the Windows and PS2 versions of a game, even if they're the same.

e.g. music digital downloads often include video tracks that can't be on the CD

if GamesBrainz was a thing, i'm 100% sure every platform release of a game would be a different release in the same group even if it's 100% identical

sometimes

or the other way around

hidden tracks on CDs

extra inserts with DVDs

also, mb does sort of have a sameness, but only for translations

in a literal sense, the "Windows version" and "PS2 version" of a game cannot be "the same" because i can't play the PS2 version on my PC

i was asking a few weeks ago about like, rereleases, but that does not exist as a relationship

in the same way i can't play a vinyl LP in my CD player even if the track content is identical

or, maybe a better example, on MB a digital and CD release are still two separate releases even if the digital version is literally just a 44.1/16 rip of the CD

<11muxxer.exe> I guess that such a databse would have to include, at least, these entities: * Game > Individual releases * Characters * Franchise (I guess it'd be the equivalent to a MBz Series) * Companies (publishers, developers, etc) * Person (everyone involved with the making of a game) I'm thinking those would be the main entities needed for any type of videogame database.

also they will have different cat#s on different media

platforms

you'll need platforms

<11muxxer.exe> Right

i don't think it has to includes 'Characters' but it would be useful if it did

to include consoles, but also OS versions

not just "pc" but like .... "windows 98"

or whatever it is

that'll matter to retro contexts, and well .... everything is retro eventually

yeah, i think a compatibility field would be useful

not compatibility

that's the platform

like have a master list of platforms (similar to instruments in MB) and select what platforms the release can run on

just like it's ps2, not just "playstation"

<11muxxer.exe> Well, I mean, if you think of it, game characters tend to be vital, but it'd be a bit complicated with the relationships, since you'd have to have them related to whoever designed them, voice actors, and then deal with the fact that a character might have variations from release to release, as well as being featured in bootleg games.

Erin: ok sure, you could have both. Platform: Windows, Compatibility: Windows 95, Windows 95, Windows ME

that would be comparable to saying "platform: playstation, compatibility: 2, 3, 4"

i feel like maybe "Windows" could be a family... but maybe that turns up some weird edge cases...

Erin: sure, what's wrong with that? many games are released exclusively on "Platform: PlayStation" and "Compatibility: PS2, PS3"

less so nowadays as Sony is releasing their entire catalogue on PC apparently... but certainly in the past

im just wondering why we need to split the fields

in my mind, the version is part of it

<11muxxer.exe> Each release would have, I suppose, relationships such as: * Genre (perhaps this should be left down to tags) * Publisher, Developers, any company or group involved * People who worked on the game * Release date for each region or country as in MBz * Console or platform * Medium * Characters * Barcodes and other identifiers * Singleplayer / Multiplayer

you might "think" of windows as a thing, rather than a collection of things, but ... it isn't

<11muxxer.exe> I could build a database scheme for this already lol

and the question is ... what's the use, i guess?

is there importance to the particular independent storage of "windows" and "xp"

it would be like trying to group release labels

which, id ont know, maybe mb has that feature?

but you sure don't need that for a release

<11muxxer.exe> I think it'd be easier to say "PC" and then be allowed to pick "Windows", "Linux" and/or "Mac", or whatever other OS. Thing is, if you include each Windows version, who's not to say you'd also have to include each Mac version, or different Linux distros?

Erin: to my mind, a "Windows release" is a specific set of binary files distinct from a "PlayStation release" or a "Linux release" or an "Atari 2600 release". but the "Windows release" may or may not run on particular Windows versions, which are attributes of that specific release

on a release edit interface, i dont pick "king" and then which sub variant of "king"

i just go "ok is it king ... or king records, for this particular era?"

windows release is not a specific set of binary files

<11muxxer.exe> You could just say "Windows" and specify compatibility in additional notes, it's not like you can't necessarily run older games in modern machines, there's usually a workaround to that.

like, if i buy an SACD, i can probably play it in my CD player using the CDDA overlay track, but it's still a "SACD release", not a "CD release"

windows encompasses 16, 32, and 64 bit machines

and that's just at the highest level

within operating system versions, we then have directX availability

yes, but you can't draw lines between those. 32-bit Windows can run 16-bit applications and 64-bit Windows can run 32-bit applications

directX will inherently be related to minimum requirements

<11muxxer.exe> ah, that too

and so, by definition, windows executable stuff will not run on older versions than it was generally thought to be for

well, you know, i don't care enough to actually argue about this since even OP appears to be arguing against their own proposal :-)

<11muxxer.exe> I was thinking, maybe engines or technologies should have an entry in the database?

<11muxxer.exe> Like, Source Engine... should it have an entry?

im picky cause i've written a lot of code that interacts with windows at a low level

...linux too actually

i think engines are worth having

sure, so i have i. i disagree with you not because i don't know what i'm talking about :-)

not as specific categorizations, but like, fields, similar to barcode?

and yes, "Engine" seems like a reasonable thing to include

<11muxxer.exe> Then I also think, what about third party software, implementations, pyshics engines and such? Perhaps those could be used too.

so yeah, thats another distinction

catagorizable data, like, things you'd search on

vs simple metadata, which is just .... fields

external engines should be added like artists

the latter ... if you can think of it, you can add it

"Physics engine: PhysX"

maybe they're relationships?

<11muxxer.exe> I also wonder if within these engines one could include its versions.

perhaps with some sort of generic 'software' entry in the same way we have 'artist' but artist can be a mixing engineering, producer, whatever

Release <blah> makes use of <engine>

sounds like relationship to me

yeah, it should be a relationship

although i guess artists are a field, so ... mixed

add 'Software: PhysX' and then add 'Physics engine: PhysX' on the release

that works for engine too

of course that means having libraries as a thing to track

and there's a slippery slope question there

what's worth having and w hat isnt

might be worth considering how versions should be tracked

yeah sure unreal engine matters

but like

e.g. if something uses Unreal 3, should that be indicated different from something using UE 5

does it matter what C++ compiler they used?

<11muxxer.exe> Which is my initial issue: managing the scope of such database. MBz doesn't track the technology or specific instruments used to record an album.

instruments exist i think

not as metadata for an album, but as credits to performers

Erin: that would actually be useful in the case of Factorio as they built some macOS releases with a too-new compiler and libc++ was missing on old releases

ohgod

so sure, if the developer says what compiler they used, why not include that

sure, but electric guitar is enough

music doesnt work like computers

if you pick up the same model, you wont play the same song

or if you're good and pick up a different model, you can

i actually think MB should say "Gibson Les Paul 1958" if that's what the credits say or there's a realiable source for it

whereas the engine, for example, is inherently a condition on which things work or dont work