Pikipedia:Guides

Pikipedia focuses first and foremost on providing encyclopedic information regarding elements of the Pikmin series. Primarily, the text in articles is meant to teach readers about elements in the series, players or otherwise. This is pure information that can be used by players, but it may not be enough to assist them in specific goals. Hence, guide sections are sometimes created that completely eschew the objective aspect of the encyclopedia in favor of focusing exclusively on helping the reader directly, as a player. On the wiki, these sections and articles can be identified with the following template:

Subjectivity
Most of the wiki is written in an objective manner, meaning it is undeniable truth, and tries to not be open to ambiguous interpretations. Guide sections forgo this because of the varying nature of guides. For the Pikmin games, there are normally multiple ways to defeat an enemy or complete a Challenge Mode level. There is no objectively factual way to reach the goal, meaning that if a wiki is to provide a guide on how to do something, it must be – by nature – not objective.

In a similar vein, guides do not contain canonical facts, unless otherwise specified.

Reader relation
Because the guides are aimed towards the player directly, they refer to them as "you". Elsewhere, the player is referred to as "the player", because a) the reader in question might not necessarily be a player, and b) text outside of strategy sections and articles is meant to be objective and informative.

In addition, the guides also commonly refer to the player in a more direct manner, like for instance, addressing their potential preferences or limitations. In a way, guide sections can be seen as a player providing assistance to another player.

Flexibility
In general, the guides included on Pikipedia should explain steps as precisely as needed, linking to other strategies if necessary. On the other hand, leaving the instructions flexible will allow players to adjust the guide to their needs and preferences. Editors contributing to guides should attempt to have their strategies be precise, but also open to exploration and experimentation. Including alternate strategies is one way to achieve this.

Uniqueness
Pikipedia does not claim that the guides provided in the relevant articles or sections are the only ways possible to handle the situation at hand. Either because a set of strategies is purposely left open to flexibility, or because there is no interest in detailing any other alternative strategies, a guide section may not contain all possible ways to achieve the specified goal.

Global effort
Given the subjective nature of guides, each editor might have a different strategy or way to explain the steps involved. Seeing as wikis can be edited by everybody, strategies are also commonly created and improved upon by more than one contributor. Tying in with the subjectiveness factor, a guide on Pikipedia is likewise open to improvement and revision.

User-made guides
Wiki editors are allowed to make pages dedicated to their own guides. Pikipedia used to contain a namespace specifically for user-made guides, but this policy has since been abandoned, and instead, users are encouraged to create sub-pages of their user page and write whatever guides they wish there. Unlike guides on articles, these are not covered by the same guidelines and general policies as normal articles, nor are they contributed to by several authors. They are the responsibility of a single editor, and normally cover much broader goals than the specific ones included in pages.

For a list of guides created by Pikipedia users, see Category:Walkthroughs.