Help:Contributing

Welcome to SlyMods! Our focus is on technical documentation of the Sly Cooper games to aid in modding and developing modding tools. If you would like to contribute but aren’t sure where to start, keep reading for how to get started.

Content Policy

When adding new content to the wiki, please abide by the following rules:

1. No copyrighted content – Do not post any copyrighted game code, assets, or content from other websites without the proper license/attribution.
2. Keep it relevant – Please only add content that is relevant to modding and reverse-engineering the Sly Cooper games.
3. Be respectful – Please be respectful of other users and their contributions. Edit warring, personal attacks, and other disrespectful behavior are not acceptable.
4. When in doubt, ask for help - If you aren't sure how to do something, or whether something is allowed, you can always ask for help on Discord or ask an administrator on their talk page.

Editing guidelines

Creating new articles

Article naming

When creating new articles, use sentence case for the title unless it is a proper noun.

E.g. Entity swap tutorial, not Entity Swap Tutorial.

Namespaces

Articles are grouped by namespace depending on which game they are related to (that's how we get those nifty badges next to the page title). These namespaces are Sly 1, Sly 2, Sly 3, and Sly 4. They are sometimes collectively referred to as gamespace.

If you are creating an article for something related to one game in particular, put the article in the namespace for that game. For instance, if you are making an article for a game mechanic in Sly 1, put the article in the Sly 1 namespace. That just means putting Sly 1: at the beginning of the article title.

• e.g. If you create an article for the Difficulty mechanic in Sly 1, name the article Sly 1:Difficulty, not Difficulty or Difficulty (Sly 1). If you are writing about the Difficulty struct in Sly 2, name the article Sly 2:Difficulty.

If you come across an article in the wrong namespace, you can rename it by going to the More menu at the top-right of the page and clicking Move.

Uploading images

If you can improve the wiki by adding an image, please do so! When in doubt, adding an image that may need to be replaced later is better than having no image at all if it will improve the article.

Image guidelines

When uploading images, please follow these guidelines:

• The preferred file type is PNG. Please do not upload JPEG images unless the only available file is a JPEG and there is no alternative.
• For in-game screenshots, capture the screenshot at the native resolution. Screenshots taken with PCSX2 should always be native resolution.
  • If you only have a screenshot that is non-native resolution and you are unable to take a new one, you can add it as long as it is a PNG. Just put {{Replace image|Not native resolution}} in the image description and someone will eventually come along to fix it.
• Use descriptive files names, eg. Sly 1 May demo debug menu.png instead of SCREENSHOT_202207050937.PNG.

Citing Sources

You can cite sources using ref tags. If you come across a statement that should have a citation but doesn't, add the {{Citation needed}} tag for future editors. If you come across a ^{[citation needed]} tag and you are able to add a source, please do so!

Citing websites

If you’re in a hurry, you can just include the URL of the source. If you have time, please include the article title, publication name, and date published as follows:

<ref name=“sly 4 review”>[https://www.ign.com/articles/2010/11/17/the-sly-collection-review?amp=1 The Sly Collection Review] - IGN, 4 May 2012</ref>

The above code will add a reference to the bottom of the page that looks like this:

The Sly Collection Review - IGN, 4 May 2012

Citing the games

If the information you are citing is coming directly from one of the games, you can use the template {{Sly 1}}, {{Sly 2}}, {{Sly 3}}, or {{Sly 4}} in the reference. For instance:

<ref>{{Sly 1}} - Developer commentary for ''Into The Machine''</ref>

This will be displayed as:

Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus - Developer commentary for Into The Machine</ref>

References section

If you includes references on an article, add a References section to the bottom of the page, like this:

== References ==
<references/>

Put it right after the last section of the article, before any maintenance or navigation templates. We do this because if you do not include the <references/> tag somewhere in the article, the references will show at the very bottom of the page, meaning they'll be hidden away below any templates like {{stub}} or {{Navbox Sly 1}}.

How to contribute

Documenting game content

Documentation is the core focus of this wiki. If, through modding or reverse-engineering, you learn some new technical information about a file format, game mechanic, or something along those lines, please add it! The goal is to make information readily accessible so it is quicker and easier to make mods.

If you have something to add something but there is no page for it, feel free to create one! Even if it’s very short, just add the {{stub}} tag to the bottom of the page, and eventually someone will come along and expand it. If you'd like to research something but don't know where to start, check out Category:Stubs for short articles that need to be expanded.

Fact-checking

One way to improve the wiki is by fact-checking statements to confirm their accuracy. The category Category:Articles needing fact-checking contains a list of pages with statements that need to be checked. If you are adding something to an article and you aren't 100% sure it's correct, add the {{check}} tag so everyone knows it is unconfirmed.

If you are able to confirm something is true, simply remove the ^[check] tag or replace it with a citation. If you check a statement and find out that it’s incorrect, feel free to correct or remove it!

Adding images

If an article has no images it is usually a good idea to add some. This is typically just means taking a screenshot in PCSX2 and uploading it. A list of articles that need images can be found at Category:Articles needing images.

See the section above for guidelines and help for uploading images.