Uncyclopedia:Pee Review/Guile (2)

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Guile

I followed the advice given to the article and made changes accordingly. Hopefully it is looking a tad better! S3ahawk 22:22, August 18, 2010 (UTC)

This is ancient, I'll get it for you. Will finish tonight. --Black Flamingo 11:55, September 24, 2010 (UTC)

Humour:	6	Howdy Mr. Hawk. Now there is some decent stuff in here, the article definitely hints at some good ideas, but I'm afraid for the most part the style of humour you use isn't particularly effective. There are several reasons for this, but the main one I feel is that it's a little overdone. The key issue I had with your humour was probably all the jokes about how "awesome" and "badass" Guile is. It was all a bit too much like Chuck Norris facts, which themselves stopped being funny a long time ago. The parts where you describe fights in particular suffered from this; and are generally just long, boring lists of unbelieveable feats of strength. I would really recommend avoiding such humour, not just because it's old hat, but because it's not really that funny anyway. To me, Chuck Norris jokes were only really funny in an ironic way, because obviously Chuck Norris always seemed pretty rubbish in real life. Maybe that was just me. The problem with doing this kind of humour with a character like Guile is that he's not really known for such things. I myself always just considered him one of many Street Fighter characters that didn't really stand out from the rest. Again, maybe I've missed something, but attributing godlike strength to Guile just seems totally random to me. So when it comes to the (probably too many) battle scenes you have, I would suggest getting rid of the Chuck Norris style humour and trying something else. The most obvious thing that springs to mind would be to make the battles sound more like typical Street Fighter battles. This is a very obvious idea, of course, and you do already employ this technique in some parts of the article. But at least it won't be random. You could even try this for other parts of his life that aren't violence-related, like his school or love life, if possible. When describing action, however, try to keep it to a minimum. Reading long lists of "moves" can get quite tiresome, so I suggest you go through the article and try to eliminate as much of this as possible. To give you an example using the fight with the poacher, try saying something like: "his accounts of his confrontation with the poacher involve an adrenaline-fueled murder, which ended with (insert steretypical Street Fighter move/incident here)." In my opinion, this could be much funnier, as you're juxtaposing a rather silly 16-bit style move with what sounds like a violent, bloody assault. Have a think of other parts of the article you might be able to play with in this way. You also fall into the trap of random humour at times. Not in a major way, but there are a few parts I feel could be strengthened if you tried something else. At the start of the article it isn't so bad, but by about half way through you realy go overboard with it and start talking about Saddam Hussein having a load of clones of himself, and Guile's newborn daughter killing the attending doctor. Stuff like this is very hard to make funny. Generally speaking, comedy has to make sense in order for people to get it. Exagerrated randomness will sometimes be funny to people who've never encountered it before, but to most others it is tiresome and nonsensical. HTBFANJS explains it better than I ever could, but I've always thought that such humour fails because it doesn't really matter what you're saying - you could substitute Saddam clones for any other absurd concept and it wouldn't make a difference. There's no skill behind it. Remember, this is supposed to be an article about a video game character, try to focus squarely on that and don't veer off topic and into randomness. Some concepts, like the clones, are rarely salvageable, but I can show you how you can strengthen some other random parts of your article. The joke about him being raised by a bald eagle, for instance, seems to come totally out of nowhere. At the same time though, I can appreciate what you're doing. I can see the link you're making (bald eagle - American hero), however I would recommend you try to strenghen this link in order to make it appear less random. Instead of just saying "a bald eagle took him as its own", say something like "impressed with his love of all things American, a bald eagle took him as its own. He taught Guile may things, including truth, justice and the ability to defy gravity." I hope you can see how this would sound less random. It would directly link the two concepts together and make the idea of an eagle adopting a man less bizarre. It also builds up to a sort of punchline, with the defying gravity joke, which I lifted from later in your article. In it's original place, the gravity joke also seemed a bit random, appearing again out of nowhere, but here it is an important part of the flow of the joke. As a sidenote, try rearranging other parts of the article like this, so the absurdity builds and crescendos, rather than just starting with an absurd fact. While my example isn't hilarious, my point is that you have to try to explain things better, so readers can understand where your humour is coming from. As a final note for humour I'll just go through your section on Theme Song. I would probably recommend getting rid of this section, let me explain why. The whole idea is kind of silly, it's probably the only part of the article that refers to Guile as a character from a game, while the rest treats him as a real person. This really makes it stick out like an inconsistent sore thumb. It also isn't a particularly strong conclusion. Now I would have nothing against you mentioning his theme tune in some other part of the article, but it's nowhere near important or funny enough to have its own section. I would also think twice about having a video embedded. This is a writing-based website, primarily. And if the video isn't of your own making, which it doesn't appear to be, I certainly wouldn't recommend it. Remember, this is supposed to be a spoof encyclopedia, not just a site where you can post your favourite youtube vids. The mem-ish nature of the video just makes it even more undesirable.
Concept:	6	Ok, after all that negativity in humour I think it's time to talk about what I did like. It first struck me in the Education section that the concept of him being a true American hero could actually be quite funny. I particularly liked the joke about the park ranger not being able to bring himself to arrest Guile. Also, the joke about his only regret after killing Ryu being that he got blood on the American flag probably got the biggest laugh out of me. This is all indicative of how the "American hero" character would be a far better concept than the tired Chuck Norris character. I definitely recommend having another think about how you portray Guile, and see if you can focus solely on this. For one, it's a lot more original, and secondly, it's a lot more believeable. Guile represented America in the game, and I guess there was something about him that seemed utterly enamoured of his country. So I think this could really work. Try to characterise him in a way that is consistent with how he appears in the game, where he certainly couldn't do all these amazing things you describe like kill Chun Li in one hit. Don't glorify him, just be realistic like you are with your treatment of the other two characters (Ryu and Chun Li, I mean) and you should be well on your way to getting this article into much better shape. I think perhaps writing as if Guile was a real person might not have been the best choice, although I'm not going to insist you change it or anything because that would require a pretty much total rehaul. What I would defintely recommend however is more references to the game. Aside from one picture, the only time you actually hint at the fact that this is a game is where you talk about the tournament (which obviously is supposed to encapsulate the Street Fighter game itself). Here you mock gameplay issues such as Chun Li's ridiculous kicks and Ryu's overuse of hadouken. This is good and I would like to see more of it. Try to think of some more original examples though, if you do get more game references in, as the two mentioned above are things we've all heard before. The Street Fighter article has a lot of good, satirical examples of this. It seems strange too, that there are a couple of references to the film but virtually none to the game. The main problem that arises from treating him as a real person is that you devote an awfully long time just to describing the biography of a fictional character (and one whose biography was never particularly well established in the first place). I would try to focus more on the stuff we actually do know, as I doubt many people will be interested in hearing a lot of this. A lot of the childhood sections go on way too long; like when the human family adopt him and all the school stuff. The paragraphs here are really long and generally only contain about one joke. A lot of these jokes aren't really worth the lengthy paragraphs you have to read. Take the one about the kid hurting himself trying to do a somersault kick, for instance. The paragraph is long but the joke isn't all that funny. It's just a description of a kid hurting himself. Definitely take a look at how the Street Fighter article deals with such subject matter, by just basically glossing over the story as not being important and focussing instead of making biting remarks aimed at Capcom. While I'm not suggesting you copy it or anything, I just think you should see how you can take a more satirical attitude towards the character. Pay particular attention to how the writer describes the plot and characters in a rather cynical tone. This might give you some more ideas of how to be funny when dealing with the character of Guile.
Prose and formatting:	6	Generally your spelling and grammar are good, although one final proofread couldn't hurt. Also remember to proofread any changes you make. The biggest problem here is really your prose. The flow is just a bit off in places. As I think I've already said, try not to just list attacks, be more succinct and perhaps just make one funny reference to the fight. There are times when you're basically just saying "and then Guile did this, and then he did that, and then he did this etc." This gets very repetitive and is a chore to read. Again, don't go on and on, just say what you want to say in as few words as possible. Go through the whole article and try to eliminate pointless clauses. For example, you say things like "after the fight, Guile did this" and "after winning his eleven victories, Guile did this". These really ruin the flow of the prose after a while, just stick with the "Guile did this" part. And just generally try and get rid of any sentences that don't have to be there, I always find this makes articles flow a lot better. Just one more thing here, the way you continually say "M Bison/Vega" gets very tiresome and is a bit awkward. I would suggest you begin by explaining why he has two different names, right at the start, then just stick with the one you think fits best for the remainder of the article. You can probably extract some humour from this name mixup as well, with the characters being confused as to who's who?
Images:	6	Overall, your images are decent, but I feel a few of your captions could do with some work. I wasn't a fan of the first GIF. But then, I'm generally not a fan of any GIFs. I just find their constant movement annoying. Stay still, damnit! Anyway, it doesn't look very encyclopaedic, just sitting there below the intro. Is there a way you could align it to the right like normal? I personally think you'd be better off with just a normal image of Guile; thumbnail style, with a funny caption. I can't even tell what's supposed to be happening in the GIF to be honest. Is it just Guile brushing his hair while Ken collapses? I don't really see the joke there. Now I do like the idea of every image being "for America", but let me give you some advice on how to do that better. Start off with basic things that Guile actually would be doing for America, like fighting battles or playing football etc, then slowly descend into more surreal things so it builds and crescendos (like I said in humour about punchlines). Don't start silly, build to it so the writer sort of knows it's coming and can therefore accept the absurdity. I also feel you could do with more pics from in the actual game? He is a game character after all. There's also a part in the education section where you talk about the dwelling Guile built for himself. I was just wondering, is this a reference to something? Like, does it appear in the game or the film or cartoon or something? If so I was just thinking you should get a picture in there to clear it up and clarify what you mean (I didn't really follow the "l-18" bit, for instance). If you weren't describing something specific and Street Fighter related there, maybe you should. You could try making the dwelling be the same as his level/arena on the game, perhaps, then get a picture of that in. That would be funnier than a random reference. I hope this makes sense to you because it really feels like I'm just rambling now.
Miscellaneous:	6	Average, obviously.
Final Score:	30	Ok so like I said there is some great stuff in here just waiting to be developed. Take another look at the things I discuss, like the characterisation of Guile, and it shouldn't be too hard for you to get this article into much better shape. I apologise if I have sounded at all harsh with you. These are just my ideas and opinions after all, I hope they help, but where you go with this is totally up to you. Anyway, that's me done. If you want help with anything more specific in the article, or if you want me to explain anything here, please let me know and I'll see if I can help.
Reviewer:	--Black Flamingo 09:11, September 25, 2010 (UTC)