Before I begin, let me be clear that this discussion is here mainly to help me crystallize my own thoughts on this issue. I'm not trying to be a "grammar nazi" or to impose my views on anyone else.
Before I begin writing my Minecraft fanfic, I've begun thinking a lot about what I like and what I don't like from reading other Minecraft literature, and indeed, from just reading the Minecraft Forums and Minecraft Wiki in general. As an Aspie, one of the things that irks me is grammatical inconsistency. I had just been posting on the forums, referring to this page on the wiki, when it dawned on me that there seems to be a common problem with consistency in capitalisation (or "capitalization" if you're an American).
As we read down the list of available achievements on that wiki page, we see various different uses of capitalisation, for instance, the Lion Tamer achievement explanation says "Tame an Ocelot" (note the capital "O" there), while the very next entry under it, for the Archer achievement mentions "creeper" with a lowercase "c". The wiki's style guide has much to say on this matter, and it seems that, as is the nature of wiki's in general, not every contributor to the wiki adheres to the style guide, resulting in these inconsistencies.
In my own fanfic writing, I will be trying to follow the wiki's style guide for nouns, leaving "prismarine" uncapitalised, but "the Nether" and "the End" should be capitalised, the same as when, in real life, we write about "the Earth". What do you think? Is grammatical consistency and style important to you in your own fanfic writing, or is this something that hasn't even crossed your mind?
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Hi, I'm Augur and I'm from New Zealand (NZ). Just call me "Augur". I'm an older person playing Minecraft Xbox 360 Legacy Console Edition without Xbox Gold (no online gaming, sorry), so please don't hate on the old. 😄
Honestly, I'm terribad with capitalization consistency, so I'd be a hypocrite if I imposed that standard on other people.
Okay... to be fair, I try to be consistent; I'm just really bad at it. I also create rules for myself where things may/may not be capitalized depending on the scenario.
So, for example, for magicking wizard-type stuff, I would write...
"an Arch-Mage of Fire"
...where "Fire" is capitalized there. But...
"fire magic"
...has "fire" uncapitalized.
There is a precedent for this with proper nouns and stuff, but not everyone agrees what a proper noun should be. But I also intentionally vary capitalization based on a character's state of mind, and that's not a standard thing. I also have changed my mind over time over what is supposed to be capitalized. I guess I could go back and fix that last point, but I'm too lazy to do that right now.
While consistency of usage is desirable, the wiki has problem enough with factual errors that I am disinclined to policing someone who writes about the colour of the bed they left in the Stronghold where they entered the portal to the end.
One common practice I have noticed in the wiki is that links sometimes follow the capitalization of the actual link (which seems to be reponsable for Ghast and Blaze in the cited list).
So long as a given author remains consistent (at least within a specific piece / post), variations from rigid adherence to a style guide is something I'm willing to overlook… particularly if I am not made to wade through misspellings, pronouns with ambiguous antecedents, split infinitives, malaprops, and missing (or improperly used) punctuation.
[Appropriate allowance is made, of course, for those not working in their native tongue.]
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"Why does everything have to be so stoopid?" Harvey Pekar (from American Splendor)
WARNING: I have an extemely "grindy" playstyle; YMMV — if this doesn't seem fun to you, mine what you can from it & bin the rest.
Before I begin, let me be clear that this discussion is here mainly to help me crystallize my own thoughts on this issue. I'm not trying to be a "grammar nazi" or to impose my views on anyone else.
Before I begin writing my Minecraft fanfic, I've begun thinking a lot about what I like and what I don't like from reading other Minecraft literature, and indeed, from just reading the Minecraft Forums and Minecraft Wiki in general. As an Aspie, one of the things that irks me is grammatical inconsistency. I had just been posting on the forums, referring to this page on the wiki, when it dawned on me that there seems to be a common problem with consistency in capitalisation (or "capitalization" if you're an American).
As we read down the list of available achievements on that wiki page, we see various different uses of capitalisation, for instance, the Lion Tamer achievement explanation says "Tame an Ocelot" (note the capital "O" there), while the very next entry under it, for the Archer achievement mentions "creeper" with a lowercase "c". The wiki's style guide has much to say on this matter, and it seems that, as is the nature of wiki's in general, not every contributor to the wiki adheres to the style guide, resulting in these inconsistencies.
In my own fanfic writing, I will be trying to follow the wiki's style guide for nouns, leaving "prismarine" uncapitalised, but "the Nether" and "the End" should be capitalised, the same as when, in real life, we write about "the Earth". What do you think? Is grammatical consistency and style important to you in your own fanfic writing, or is this something that hasn't even crossed your mind?
Hi, I'm Augur and I'm from New Zealand (NZ). Just call me "Augur". I'm an older person playing Minecraft Xbox 360 Legacy Console Edition without Xbox Gold (no online gaming, sorry), so please don't hate on the old. 😄
Honestly, I'm terribad with capitalization consistency, so I'd be a hypocrite if I imposed that standard on other people.
Okay... to be fair, I try to be consistent; I'm just really bad at it. I also create rules for myself where things may/may not be capitalized depending on the scenario.
So, for example, for magicking wizard-type stuff, I would write...
"an Arch-Mage of Fire"
...where "Fire" is capitalized there. But...
"fire magic"
...has "fire" uncapitalized.
There is a precedent for this with proper nouns and stuff, but not everyone agrees what a proper noun should be. But I also intentionally vary capitalization based on a character's state of mind, and that's not a standard thing. I also have changed my mind over time over what is supposed to be capitalized. I guess I could go back and fix that last point, but I'm too lazy to do that right now.
While consistency of usage is desirable, the wiki has problem enough with factual errors that I am disinclined to policing someone who writes about the colour of the bed they left in the Stronghold where they entered the portal to the end.
One common practice I have noticed in the wiki is that links sometimes follow the capitalization of the actual link (which seems to be reponsable for Ghast and Blaze in the cited list).
So long as a given author remains consistent (at least within a specific piece / post), variations from rigid adherence to a style guide is something I'm willing to overlook… particularly if I am not made to wade through misspellings, pronouns with ambiguous antecedents, split infinitives, malaprops, and missing (or improperly used) punctuation.
[Appropriate allowance is made, of course, for those not working in their native tongue.]