I've been thinking on this topic, and I know that this is possibly opening up a big bag of worms. So here's a big, bold disclaimer: I am not, in any way, suggesting that we adopt a citation policy akin to Wikipedia's. You will not have to cite absolutely everything on here, nor will we need to use Wikipedia's excessively complex system.

What I do suggest is this: that statements of a controversial or dubious nature are sourced. This includes:

• Information from interviews
• Recent updates on unreleased games
• Magazine scans
• Japan-only publications, such as the Ultimania

Why do I suggest this? We've all seen the rush in updating articles for new releases. We've seen arguments on obscure novellas and backstories. This information isn't readily available to us - thus I think it would be prudent if a person adding this could include a reference, whether on the page itself or the discussion page. This allows us to assess whether this information is real, and makes it easier for another editor to track it down.

Fact is, it's hard for us to know whether things of this nature are true, or made up on the spot. Think of the "Lightning in Dissidia" hoax, or the information on Kefka's past. A simple "this information was found in the September 2009 issue of Famitsu, in an interview with Akihiko Yoshida on page 56-58" could help us.

Thoughts? — Yuan^Salve!_Acta 04:41, November 24, 2009 (UTC)

		FëasindëTalk "Burn the land, boil the sea, you can't take the sky from me." 04:56, November 24, 2009 (UTC)
		If you won't listen to Faethin, listen to Yuan. I'm all for it. 'Bout darned time.

		Drake Clawfang - Crossing the distant night...Wandering the desert sea...The gods' voices are mirages... TALK - 04:57, November 24, 2009 (UTC)
		Support, a lot of the information we provide is pretty vague. It's important we let readers know that some of our more obscure data isn't just made up speculation, because sometimes it seems so...the Kefka debacle comes to mind.... Come vote in the Soul Shrine and take one of my Final Fantasy quizzes.

		Yuan 翠珊 — 10:45, November 24, 2009 (UTC) "He wants to write a love song / An anthem of forgiving / A manual for living with defeat"
		Coding example. It's simple to use. Blessings to the person who thought to import the Reflist template here.

		Griffen78 - who needs high hp when you got a smexy jacket like this? TALK - 21:24, November 24, 2009 (UTC)
		I think it is a great idea, but me not being a big editor or not really a editor at all I don't see how my say would matter, but in any case ya it is a good suggestion

		Armageddon11 - "At the end of the dream... even chaos tears itself apart!" TALK - 21:30, November 24, 2009 (UTC)
		I support the idea. Don't expect me to elaborate on my opinion, I don't edit the mainspace enough to know what's best for it.

EDIT CONFLICT: Hmm. I have mixed feelings about this. I'm afraid of seeing thousands of reference lists with gamefaqs links, and that's not a pretty sight. I think it should be used exclusively for Ultimania and interview information, as it provides information about what kind of extra content Ultimanias bring. One way or another, magazine scans are always confirmed when the game comes out and can be left alone being cited in summaries.

But I swear. If I see any gamefaqs or youtube or "Final Fantasy #" reference, I'll flame all this crap to hell.

@Armageddon: "Don't expect me to elaborate on my opinion, I don't edit the mainspace enough to know what's best for it.". If you're not giving an elaborated opinion, and don't care about the mainspace...why care at first place? - Henryacores^ 21:36, November 24, 2009 (UTC)

I didn't say I don't care about the mainspace, only that I (unfortunately) don't edit it enough (or at all) to be able to say something constructive about this. So I just said I support Yuan's suggestion, which is all I can really say.  Armageddon11!  21:25, November 25, 2009 (UTC)

		Yuan 翠珊 — 04:10, November 25, 2009 (UTC) "He wants to write a love song / An anthem of forgiving / A manual for living with defeat"
		Anything we can source from the games themselves, we will not worry about referencing. No links to Gamefaqs, as it isn't a reliable source. Always reference primary sources if possible.

		ScatheMote - 04:18, November 25, 2009 (UTC)
		Edit Conflict: Support, and I agree with the things that Yuan said we should cite (though I also agree with Henry on the fact that we can skip citing magazine scans, since we get the images from the magazines or a link to the images quickly), so we can judge whether or not they are official (which is the basis for the FFVI character's backstory debate). Also, what is or not official should go in the MoS, though no one really reads that. Edit: Though, after thinking about it, some users will cite places like Gamefaqs and IMDB anyway. So, we'll have to do a large to make known what and what not to be cited, and make efforts to talk to the users who are incorrectly citing.

		Yuan 翠珊 — 04:56, November 25, 2009 (UTC) "He wants to write a love song / An anthem of forgiving / A manual for living with defeat"
		With citing magazine scans, what exactly would be the difference between typing <ref>[link]</ref> and putting it in the edit summary? Both are just as easy, and the first is easier to see.

		8bit BlackMage - Beyond the Sky TALK - Why do chemists call helium, curium, and barium 'the medical elements'? Because, if you can't 'helium' or 'curium', you... um... ._.; - 06:13, November 25, 2009 (UTC)
		What I do suggest is this: that statements of a controversial or dubious nature are sourced. This includes: Information from interviews Recent updates on unreleased games Magazine scans Japan-only publications, such as the Ultimania This implies that the Ultimania is dubious? Although, it only comes out about a year after its respective game. I am starting to see that my previous opinion of "remove the sources when the game comes out" might not be best in all occasions, as with the Kefka backstory that remained here even ten years after the game's release. magazine scans, recent updates, and interviews (real ones, not alluded to in some forum) have the potential to be false, though. So, sources such as player summon, voice actor, and anything else that is obviously revealed when the game is released can be removed at that time. However, it does help to have the Ultimania link present, or Famitsu page, etc. I would prefer that these go on the discussion page, but presence on the page itself presents more of a standard. Things like external backstory not present in the game and exposed in another type of media could be sourced, yes. I don't see where the sourcing system could hurt if "obvious" links are removed. It does help to have those verified links on the mainspace page, saying "Yes, we believe the views put forth in this source."

		Yuan 翠珊 — 06:52, November 25, 2009 (UTC) "He wants to write a love song / An anthem of forgiving / A manual for living with defeat"
		Posting my explanation on the IRC: "Information put forth as "coming from the Ultimania" is dubious, because we don't know until we check a translation. Not the actual Ultimania information." There appears to be a little confusion on how citing works: Information that appears in the game/movie itself is considered to be a primary source. This does not need to be sourced. Wikipedia, GameFAQs, IMDb, forums and the like are tertiary sources and can be unreliable. We will not accept sources from them. We source the actual information, not what covers it. If, for example, Kotaku has an article on Famitsu hosting an interview with Sakaguchi, we don't link to Kotaku. We cite the issue and page number of the Famitsu interview, scan link optional but encouraged. The references are not only for us to peruse, but also any anonymous viewers we have who want to see where we get the information from. The article is more accessible than the discussion, history or forum pages, thus we should keep all references there. I think we all agree that backstory and world information that doesn't appear in the game should be cited. Now for unreleased games. I think that 8bit's point is correct - that information which is confirmed by the game's release, but which was sourced before, can have the references removed. Hence: "Shantotto appears in Dissidia as an unlockable character," is referenced before the game's release, and has its citation removed after. "Nomura stated that he wanted to include Kain Highwind as a playable character in Dissidia," retains its reference because this information isn't present in the game. "X was supposed to occur in the game during development [ref], but was replaced with Y." The reference notes what happened in X. "Princess Ashe is the only daughter of the royal family, and has Y brothers," gets a ref and keeps it, because this was found in an Ultimania. @Scathe: The awareness issue is easily solved. Big [CITATION NEEDED] tags! Bad joke, I apologise. Site notice, help page, MoS, News Box, Welcome template link, and maybe a link added to the Unreleased template. Of course, we will also inform specific users directly if needed.

		Exdeath64 - Happy thanksgiving, now if you hear anything from Oregon about a guy shooting frozen turkeys out of a pneumatic cannon onto the freeway, I had absolutely nothing to do with it. TALK - {{time=Exdeath64 19:25, 15 February 2009 (UTC)}}

		Xenomic TALK - 05:42, November 29, 2009 (UTC)
		*Stamps approval on topic*