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This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Digitalhumanitiestudent1. Peer reviewers: Menschel, Dmakeever, Paxiwiki.
Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT ( talk) 06:54, 17 January 2022 (UTC)
If you do a search of the USPTO on the company name SINNESLOSCHEN, the name has only been registered once in the United States, as an LLC in 2008.
This indicates the chance of the screenshot within the article is a fabrication is relatively high. [1]
— Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.16.29.166 ( talk) 14:29, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
The article in its current form is almost useless. It doesnt even properly tell the history and development of the hoax. Everything in the article that can't be sourced should be removed.
The hoax started with the game description on coinop.org in 1998. It continued in a small set of usenet group posts in 2001. Then there were the magazine articles a couple years later. Then there was Steven Roach. Then there are the various cabinet sightings. There is no pre-1998 history to any of this. Speculation about games that might match the stories told about the game have no place in the article.
Right now, the article reads like a bulletin board for hoaxers. 75.17.124.26 ( talk) 03:23, 20 January 2014 (UTC)
Je viens tout juste de visionner une émission télévisée dans laquelle on parlait du jeu Polybius. Ce n'est pas un canular, le jeu a bel et bien existé. Je viens du Québec, l'émission est une traduction en français pour moi et je n'arrive pas à trouver le titre original de l'émission.
[1] — Preceding
unsigned comment added by
74.59.63.29 (
talk) 03:13, 22 October 2019 (UTC)
References
Trolling/hoax/Snopes content wouldn't make it on here.
But I stand corrected. 68.38.197.76 ( talk) 23:17, 20 January 2014 (UTC)
Ok. I dont see and cannot find any source for the following claims made in the article. Unless someone can produce sources for this material, its eventually going to be removed.
- The game proved to be incredibly popular, to the point of addiction, and lines formed around the machines, often resulting in fighting over who played next.
- an unheard-of new arcade game appeared in several suburbs of Portland
- This was followed by clusters of visits from men in black. Rather than the usual marketing data collected by company visitors to arcade machines, they collected some unknown data, allegedly testing responses to the psychoactive machines.
- In some versions of this mystery, the players suffered from a series of unpleasant side effects, including amnesia, insomnia, nightmares and night terrors.
- The supposed creator of Polybius is Ed Rotberg, and the company named in most accounts of the game, Sinneslöschen (German meaning "deletion/erasure of senses, Sense-delete"), often named as either a secret government organization or a codename for Atari.
- The gameplay is said to be similar to Tempest (a shoot 'em up game using vector graphics), while the game is said to contain subliminal messages which would influence the action of anyone playing it.
69.198.25.2 ( talk) 19:51, 21 January 2014 (UTC)
I believe this article demonstrates an overall bias to assume the game is pure fiction, using words like "supposed" or "alleged" next to many descriptions of the game throughout the article. For instance, the introductory paragraph states "Not much evidence for the existence of such a game has ever been discovered," which implies that the writer was hoping to find no evidence. Instead, it should say something like "There has been only trace evidence that Polybius was manufactured and released." Another good example is the thumbnail of the title screen, which reads "Title frame of the alleged game", implying that the game is only "alleged" ( Wiktionary: "supposed but doubtful"), which directly contrasts to the image's description page, which inarguably states the game is real, non-free, and under copyright protection (another bias we might want to work over). A better caption might read "Title frame of Polybius", since the game's existence or lack thereof has already been declared above. There are more examples of this in the article, such as "According to the story", "The supposed creator", and even "a "lack of hard evidence" situation typical of hoaxes." — Supuhstar * — 03:32, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
So Wikipedia has moved to accepting creepypasta tales as articles? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.250.159.172 ( talk) 17:23, 11 June 2014 (UTC)
It's more of a theory, anyway. TVShowFan122 ( talk) 12:23, 27 April 2015 (UTC)
How is it a theory? It's a story that has nothing suggesting it goes beyond fiction.
The image that the article was referring to for Wreck It Ralph is a hoax.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8bCFV4uhwA — Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.13.198.218 ( talk) 15:35, 7 August 2014 (UTC)
Not sure this section meets Wikipedia's sourcing standards - a guy giving an interview is a primary source and I'm not even sure that Gamepulse.co.uk is that reliable a source in the first place, and gamecola.net which did the follow-up analysis looks like a WP:SPS group blog. Given that this only adds up to "guy claimed to have worked on the game, was probably lying" anyway and doesn't seem to have gotten any wider coverage, maybe we should lose it. -- McGeddon ( talk) 16:54, 13 October 2014 (UTC)
In 2009, it appeared as if the author of the coinop.org description of the game added new material to the entry:
It seems likely that the person who modified the entry in 2009 was the same one who created it years before. The comment introduces four new story elements:
- It denies the Roach story. - It denies that it was a Tempest prototype - It denies that it was a vector graphics based game - It denies that the title screen looked like vector graphics
This might be worth adding to the article in some form since everything in the urban legend really sources back to that entry at coinop.org. 75.17.124.85 ( talk) 01:14, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
TVShowFan122 ( talk) 16:52, 13 March 2015 (UTC) Apparently, in late 2012, someone uploaded 4 photos relating to the game, in which he claimed he had a machine, to Instagram. Here: https://instagram.com/p/RLBoqaxy0C/ https://instagram.com/p/RLOzE-xy8J/ https://instagram.com/p/RYUxK8Ry7b/ https://instagram.com/p/RgSF1zRyzZ/ Sorry if you can't add any links, if it's the case I wasn't aware of it. Also, I think Steven Roach should be added again, because I think the interview is important enough. TVShowFan122 ( talk) 16:52, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
TVShowFan122 ( talk) 17:19, 15 March 2015 (UTC)Ok then. Delete this section, please. (unless I can do it by myself.)
So since there's an actual video game coming out called Polybius, maybe a move is reasonable? // Gargaj ( talk) 12:21, 8 October 2016 (UTC)
Seeing as said game has now come out, I would definitely agree that a move is warranted. WNivek ( talk) 16:29, 10 May 2017 (UTC)
The result of the move request was: moved per consensus. ( closed by non-admin page mover) QEDK ( 愛 • 海) 15:38, 17 September 2017 (UTC)
The request to rename this article to Polybius (urban legend) has been carried out. |
Polybius (video game) → Polybius (urban legend) – There is an actual video game titled Polybius, then there's this, which can be confirmed to be an urban legend. The actual game is only relatable by name and doesn't belong on the article here. The article for the urban legend shouldn't even have "video game" in the title since it's non-existent. I'm not sure if this recently-released documentary could serve as an additional source for this or not. Aria1561 ( talk) 16:42, 9 September 2017 (UTC)
The article currently states that Polybius is a "1998 urban legend". The date of 1998 is presumably taken from the coinop Polybious page. However evidence suggests that the page was created in 2000. The earliest captured instance of the Polybius coionop page in the Wayback Machine was captured on 3 march 2000 which displays a "latest modified date" of 6 february 2000, as well as a "reason for modification" with the value "New addition" - anyone heard of this game?" I cite these facts from this video by the YouTube channel Ahoy: POLYBIUS - The Video Game That Doesn't Exist. Torr3 ( talk) 00:13, 10 September 2017 (UTC)
But, I think even writing that Polybius is a "2000" urban legend" is misleading. Because it seems that the legend was not widely known until 2003 when the story was published in the GamePro magazine. Torr3 ( talk) 00:16, 10 September 2017 (UTC)
Sorry, the article actually says that Polybius is an "alleged 1981 arcade game described in a 1998 urban legend". Is that correct grammar though? Torr3 ( talk) 00:20, 10 September 2017 (UTC)
How come the AVGN's Polybius episode isn't mentioned in the popular culture section? The series is notable enough to have its own Wikipedia article after all. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.120.182.252 ( talk) 02:03, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
I think you did a good job improving the more confusingly written sentences that were in the original article. Furthermore I think you have reorganized the article effectively, making it easier to follow. Of course, as you wrote, you did not edit the entire article, but still, the sections you edited have been improved in terms of organization quality, and content.
I think you did a good job keeping a neutral tone. It does not seem like you're partial to either side, or that you are trying to persuade me, the reader, to adopt a particular position on the legitimacy of Polybius legend. Your links all work and are relevant. Also, from what I could tell, you do not seem to be under or over-representing any arguments.
The legend is quite old, at least by the standards of the internet, and I think you did a great job of including sources from the time that exist. You also included a comprehensive article from 2015 which I thought was great. I felt that this stuck a good balance between what was said at the time, and what is being said about Polybius in hindsight. If there were more modern sources on the legend that would be great, but I understand that this isn't very common or possible with a lot of urban legends.
I am not sure how citations with pictures work on Wikipedia, but your picture of the "Start" screen is good and relevant, so I think it would be a great addition. Is it OK to cite if you provide a link to the website?
I think you're on the right track, keep doing what your're doing! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Paxiwiki ( talk • contribs) 21:32, 9 November 2017 (UTC)
The video game infobox template is at the time of writing used in the article (though I might just change it after this post). I think this is a mistake because this article is about the urban legend Polybius, not the video game Polybius. The infobox fields currently used in the article, "Developer", "Publisher" and "Release", are not important aspects of the myth (excluding title and image, though I have to say the image is questionable). At least not as important to be included in an infobox. It is like including the speed of the ship RMS Titanic in the infobox for the 1977 film Titanic. Torr3 ( talk) 02:33, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Hi, I just wanted to bring attention to a forgotten arcade game from the 80s that might have served as one of the bases of the Polybius myth, Cube Quest. One can find videos of it on YouTube and other places. It fits a lot of the descriptions of Polybius, such as it being a tempest-like game with puzzle elements, and I could see how how the psychedelic Laserdisk backgrounds might have caused seizures, etc. Also Laserdisk games were prone to breaking, so that would explain it mysteriously disappearing from arcades. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.247.216.140 ( talk) 05:17, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
Would the possible connection to Poly Play be worth mentioning?-- Professor Phantasm ( talk) 11:26, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
I found a site where someone who is talking about Polybius differently. I typed in the website called AMAfeed and his name was Klaus Saller, I think he told the truth about Polybius.
SonicTV64 ( talk) 21:14, 18 September 2018 (UTC)
As long as we are clear that the game is (probably) fictional, I fail to see anything wrong with placing qualified statements ("alleged," "claimed," etc.) in the Infobox. As for precedent, we have birth and death dates for Lord of the Rings characters. Aragorn, for example, has an Infobox listing him as born in Third Age 2931 and died in Fourth Age 120.
Again, we have birth and death dates for Lord of the Rings characters! Placing qualified statements to acknowledge urban legend status, this does not in any way magically lend credence to someone claiming the game was real just by virtue of being in the Infobox at all.
Anyone wishing to try to refute the above argument should please do that here, on the Talk Page! Stop edit warring, and stop posting commented-out notes that haven't been discussed on the Talk Page. The Mysterious El Willstro ( talk) 05:18, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
I'm surprised there is absolutely no mention of the Ahoy documentary and deep-dive on the topic. He did more research and dug up more details and facts than anyone ever has. In fact, Stuart Brown even contacted the person who most likely started the whole legend.
Should there be a section about the game's prevalence in things like webcomics? (For example, I only learned of this because it is part of the story in the webcomic 'addictive science') 0w0 catt0s ( talk) 04:11, 28 June 2020 (UTC)
There should be a reference to 2020 film "Ashens and the Polybius Heist", a comedy film where the characters search for the titular Polybius video game. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9170580/ 71.245.67.247 ( talk) 02:21, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
All,
Polybius is an urban legend and I feel like basically all of the happenings to this urban legend in the past few years are not mentioned on this page. There are three movie projects featuring or referencing Polybius that were released in 2020 that are no longer on the page. There was an info dump with an 80+ page US House of Representatives hearing on Polybius (which is likely fake but it is far more substantial and substantive than the various rumors referenced here). No offense to Rogue Synapse but their definition of the urban legend has now been challenged by multiple sources and all of the edits I see from the past year or two are now deleted or reverted.
To be frank, this article needs a new format and a re-write from fresh eyes. To ignore all of the current "discoveries" or references related to the urban legend in a Wikipedia page about the urban legend makes the page misleading. I would volunteer to tackle the project but it seems extremely likely that any work put into this page will be deleted.
Please advise.
— Preceding unsigned comment added by Arcadephreak ( talk • contribs) 16:34, 21 December 2020 (UTC)
None of the sources on this page are reliable and the page is a complete wreck. Just because a gaming blog does an article on unverified sources does not somehow permit the unverified sources to be used as fact on this page. There are now four or five corroborated events related to Polybius that have been deleted or removed from the page. There is a US House of Representatives document that is not cited or sourced. This article is junk now.
In the Netflix animated series Inside Job, a Polybius game appears in an "employees only" arcade, at a organization responsible for managing government conspiracies. Appearance is in season 1, episode 2, 4m50s into the episode. I don't know how to cite something like this since it would be flagged as "original research." Would go in the "popular culture" section. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:600:877F:BF00:B52F:A2E1:126B:AFD2 ( talk) 19:47, 28 November 2021 (UTC)
I’ve removed the following as original research, since that’s literally what it was:
although no such copyright has ever been registered. [1]
If there’s a reliable source we can cite as making the same negative claim, it should be restored with that source instead. — 151.132.206.250 ( talk) 18:45, 5 October 2022 (UTC)
[the game’s namesake was] known for his assertion that historians should never report what they cannot verify through interviews with eyewitnesses. [2]
Polybius begins his history proper with the 140th Olympiad because accounts of the remote past amount to hearsay and do not allow for safe judgements (διαλήψεις) and assertions (ἀποφάσεις) regarding the course of events.... he can relate events he saw himself, or he can use the testimony of eyewitnesses. ([footnote 34:] Pol. 4.2.2: ἐξ οὗ συµβαίνει τοῖς µὲν αὐτοὺς ἡµᾶς παραγεγονέναι, τὰ δὲ παρὰ τῶν ἑωρακότων ἀκηκοέναι.)(archive URLs: full text, abstract & journal citation)
...had an episode dedicated to this, probably a worthy inclusion in the pop culture section. 137.118.200.132 ( talk) 03:51, 26 October 2022 (UTC)
Many Polybius cabinets actually still exist today, but that is not mentioned. Goofyahadude1013p310 ( talk) 17:59, 24 January 2023 (UTC)
@ Greenboi123: I see that you wish to add Stuart Brown (Ahoy) to the article as a reliable source. Do you have any source (aside from him) that could establish such credibility? I found a Kotaku article that mentions him but I do not believe it is enough. It also does not go into detail on his research, which I feel it appropriate to say is self-published.
Edit: The Kotaku article cites Wikipedia, which makes me worry about A. circular references and B. their investigative techniques. Tireauclaire ( talk) 21:52, 4 May 2023 (UTC)
@
LooneyLoaiza: Per
WP:BRD I have again removed the addition of the The Simpsons entry in the "In popular culture" section per
MOS:POPCULT, which says A source should cover the subject's cultural impact in some depth; it should not be a source that merely mentions the subject's appearance in a movie, song, television show, or other cultural item.
The
source used for that entry is very much a passing mention of Polybius being shown on The Simpsons. The source says nothing about the appearance on The Simpsons as being culturally impactful in any way, and the only thing that source verifies is that The Simpsons made a passing reference to Polybius in the background of one scene in one episode. That is precisely the type of
WP:TRIVIA that
MOS:POPCULT seeks to avoid and why it was reverted. -
Aoidh (
talk) 12:36, 7 June 2023 (UTC)
What is this description of this article named "the storm is coming"? 50.53.66.139 ( talk) 21:43, 16 January 2024 (UTC)
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This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Digitalhumanitiestudent1. Peer reviewers: Menschel, Dmakeever, Paxiwiki.
Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT ( talk) 06:54, 17 January 2022 (UTC)
If you do a search of the USPTO on the company name SINNESLOSCHEN, the name has only been registered once in the United States, as an LLC in 2008.
This indicates the chance of the screenshot within the article is a fabrication is relatively high. [1]
— Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.16.29.166 ( talk) 14:29, 2 May 2013 (UTC)
The article in its current form is almost useless. It doesnt even properly tell the history and development of the hoax. Everything in the article that can't be sourced should be removed.
The hoax started with the game description on coinop.org in 1998. It continued in a small set of usenet group posts in 2001. Then there were the magazine articles a couple years later. Then there was Steven Roach. Then there are the various cabinet sightings. There is no pre-1998 history to any of this. Speculation about games that might match the stories told about the game have no place in the article.
Right now, the article reads like a bulletin board for hoaxers. 75.17.124.26 ( talk) 03:23, 20 January 2014 (UTC)
Je viens tout juste de visionner une émission télévisée dans laquelle on parlait du jeu Polybius. Ce n'est pas un canular, le jeu a bel et bien existé. Je viens du Québec, l'émission est une traduction en français pour moi et je n'arrive pas à trouver le titre original de l'émission.
[1] — Preceding
unsigned comment added by
74.59.63.29 (
talk) 03:13, 22 October 2019 (UTC)
References
Trolling/hoax/Snopes content wouldn't make it on here.
But I stand corrected. 68.38.197.76 ( talk) 23:17, 20 January 2014 (UTC)
Ok. I dont see and cannot find any source for the following claims made in the article. Unless someone can produce sources for this material, its eventually going to be removed.
- The game proved to be incredibly popular, to the point of addiction, and lines formed around the machines, often resulting in fighting over who played next.
- an unheard-of new arcade game appeared in several suburbs of Portland
- This was followed by clusters of visits from men in black. Rather than the usual marketing data collected by company visitors to arcade machines, they collected some unknown data, allegedly testing responses to the psychoactive machines.
- In some versions of this mystery, the players suffered from a series of unpleasant side effects, including amnesia, insomnia, nightmares and night terrors.
- The supposed creator of Polybius is Ed Rotberg, and the company named in most accounts of the game, Sinneslöschen (German meaning "deletion/erasure of senses, Sense-delete"), often named as either a secret government organization or a codename for Atari.
- The gameplay is said to be similar to Tempest (a shoot 'em up game using vector graphics), while the game is said to contain subliminal messages which would influence the action of anyone playing it.
69.198.25.2 ( talk) 19:51, 21 January 2014 (UTC)
I believe this article demonstrates an overall bias to assume the game is pure fiction, using words like "supposed" or "alleged" next to many descriptions of the game throughout the article. For instance, the introductory paragraph states "Not much evidence for the existence of such a game has ever been discovered," which implies that the writer was hoping to find no evidence. Instead, it should say something like "There has been only trace evidence that Polybius was manufactured and released." Another good example is the thumbnail of the title screen, which reads "Title frame of the alleged game", implying that the game is only "alleged" ( Wiktionary: "supposed but doubtful"), which directly contrasts to the image's description page, which inarguably states the game is real, non-free, and under copyright protection (another bias we might want to work over). A better caption might read "Title frame of Polybius", since the game's existence or lack thereof has already been declared above. There are more examples of this in the article, such as "According to the story", "The supposed creator", and even "a "lack of hard evidence" situation typical of hoaxes." — Supuhstar * — 03:32, 20 February 2014 (UTC)
So Wikipedia has moved to accepting creepypasta tales as articles? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.250.159.172 ( talk) 17:23, 11 June 2014 (UTC)
It's more of a theory, anyway. TVShowFan122 ( talk) 12:23, 27 April 2015 (UTC)
How is it a theory? It's a story that has nothing suggesting it goes beyond fiction.
The image that the article was referring to for Wreck It Ralph is a hoax.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8bCFV4uhwA — Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.13.198.218 ( talk) 15:35, 7 August 2014 (UTC)
Not sure this section meets Wikipedia's sourcing standards - a guy giving an interview is a primary source and I'm not even sure that Gamepulse.co.uk is that reliable a source in the first place, and gamecola.net which did the follow-up analysis looks like a WP:SPS group blog. Given that this only adds up to "guy claimed to have worked on the game, was probably lying" anyway and doesn't seem to have gotten any wider coverage, maybe we should lose it. -- McGeddon ( talk) 16:54, 13 October 2014 (UTC)
In 2009, it appeared as if the author of the coinop.org description of the game added new material to the entry:
It seems likely that the person who modified the entry in 2009 was the same one who created it years before. The comment introduces four new story elements:
- It denies the Roach story. - It denies that it was a Tempest prototype - It denies that it was a vector graphics based game - It denies that the title screen looked like vector graphics
This might be worth adding to the article in some form since everything in the urban legend really sources back to that entry at coinop.org. 75.17.124.85 ( talk) 01:14, 21 December 2014 (UTC)
TVShowFan122 ( talk) 16:52, 13 March 2015 (UTC) Apparently, in late 2012, someone uploaded 4 photos relating to the game, in which he claimed he had a machine, to Instagram. Here: https://instagram.com/p/RLBoqaxy0C/ https://instagram.com/p/RLOzE-xy8J/ https://instagram.com/p/RYUxK8Ry7b/ https://instagram.com/p/RgSF1zRyzZ/ Sorry if you can't add any links, if it's the case I wasn't aware of it. Also, I think Steven Roach should be added again, because I think the interview is important enough. TVShowFan122 ( talk) 16:52, 13 March 2015 (UTC)
TVShowFan122 ( talk) 17:19, 15 March 2015 (UTC)Ok then. Delete this section, please. (unless I can do it by myself.)
So since there's an actual video game coming out called Polybius, maybe a move is reasonable? // Gargaj ( talk) 12:21, 8 October 2016 (UTC)
Seeing as said game has now come out, I would definitely agree that a move is warranted. WNivek ( talk) 16:29, 10 May 2017 (UTC)
The result of the move request was: moved per consensus. ( closed by non-admin page mover) QEDK ( 愛 • 海) 15:38, 17 September 2017 (UTC)
The request to rename this article to Polybius (urban legend) has been carried out. |
Polybius (video game) → Polybius (urban legend) – There is an actual video game titled Polybius, then there's this, which can be confirmed to be an urban legend. The actual game is only relatable by name and doesn't belong on the article here. The article for the urban legend shouldn't even have "video game" in the title since it's non-existent. I'm not sure if this recently-released documentary could serve as an additional source for this or not. Aria1561 ( talk) 16:42, 9 September 2017 (UTC)
The article currently states that Polybius is a "1998 urban legend". The date of 1998 is presumably taken from the coinop Polybious page. However evidence suggests that the page was created in 2000. The earliest captured instance of the Polybius coionop page in the Wayback Machine was captured on 3 march 2000 which displays a "latest modified date" of 6 february 2000, as well as a "reason for modification" with the value "New addition" - anyone heard of this game?" I cite these facts from this video by the YouTube channel Ahoy: POLYBIUS - The Video Game That Doesn't Exist. Torr3 ( talk) 00:13, 10 September 2017 (UTC)
But, I think even writing that Polybius is a "2000" urban legend" is misleading. Because it seems that the legend was not widely known until 2003 when the story was published in the GamePro magazine. Torr3 ( talk) 00:16, 10 September 2017 (UTC)
Sorry, the article actually says that Polybius is an "alleged 1981 arcade game described in a 1998 urban legend". Is that correct grammar though? Torr3 ( talk) 00:20, 10 September 2017 (UTC)
How come the AVGN's Polybius episode isn't mentioned in the popular culture section? The series is notable enough to have its own Wikipedia article after all. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.120.182.252 ( talk) 02:03, 6 November 2017 (UTC)
I think you did a good job improving the more confusingly written sentences that were in the original article. Furthermore I think you have reorganized the article effectively, making it easier to follow. Of course, as you wrote, you did not edit the entire article, but still, the sections you edited have been improved in terms of organization quality, and content.
I think you did a good job keeping a neutral tone. It does not seem like you're partial to either side, or that you are trying to persuade me, the reader, to adopt a particular position on the legitimacy of Polybius legend. Your links all work and are relevant. Also, from what I could tell, you do not seem to be under or over-representing any arguments.
The legend is quite old, at least by the standards of the internet, and I think you did a great job of including sources from the time that exist. You also included a comprehensive article from 2015 which I thought was great. I felt that this stuck a good balance between what was said at the time, and what is being said about Polybius in hindsight. If there were more modern sources on the legend that would be great, but I understand that this isn't very common or possible with a lot of urban legends.
I am not sure how citations with pictures work on Wikipedia, but your picture of the "Start" screen is good and relevant, so I think it would be a great addition. Is it OK to cite if you provide a link to the website?
I think you're on the right track, keep doing what your're doing! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Paxiwiki ( talk • contribs) 21:32, 9 November 2017 (UTC)
The video game infobox template is at the time of writing used in the article (though I might just change it after this post). I think this is a mistake because this article is about the urban legend Polybius, not the video game Polybius. The infobox fields currently used in the article, "Developer", "Publisher" and "Release", are not important aspects of the myth (excluding title and image, though I have to say the image is questionable). At least not as important to be included in an infobox. It is like including the speed of the ship RMS Titanic in the infobox for the 1977 film Titanic. Torr3 ( talk) 02:33, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Hi, I just wanted to bring attention to a forgotten arcade game from the 80s that might have served as one of the bases of the Polybius myth, Cube Quest. One can find videos of it on YouTube and other places. It fits a lot of the descriptions of Polybius, such as it being a tempest-like game with puzzle elements, and I could see how how the psychedelic Laserdisk backgrounds might have caused seizures, etc. Also Laserdisk games were prone to breaking, so that would explain it mysteriously disappearing from arcades. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 187.247.216.140 ( talk) 05:17, 18 June 2018 (UTC)
Would the possible connection to Poly Play be worth mentioning?-- Professor Phantasm ( talk) 11:26, 21 August 2018 (UTC)
I found a site where someone who is talking about Polybius differently. I typed in the website called AMAfeed and his name was Klaus Saller, I think he told the truth about Polybius.
SonicTV64 ( talk) 21:14, 18 September 2018 (UTC)
As long as we are clear that the game is (probably) fictional, I fail to see anything wrong with placing qualified statements ("alleged," "claimed," etc.) in the Infobox. As for precedent, we have birth and death dates for Lord of the Rings characters. Aragorn, for example, has an Infobox listing him as born in Third Age 2931 and died in Fourth Age 120.
Again, we have birth and death dates for Lord of the Rings characters! Placing qualified statements to acknowledge urban legend status, this does not in any way magically lend credence to someone claiming the game was real just by virtue of being in the Infobox at all.
Anyone wishing to try to refute the above argument should please do that here, on the Talk Page! Stop edit warring, and stop posting commented-out notes that haven't been discussed on the Talk Page. The Mysterious El Willstro ( talk) 05:18, 9 December 2018 (UTC)
I'm surprised there is absolutely no mention of the Ahoy documentary and deep-dive on the topic. He did more research and dug up more details and facts than anyone ever has. In fact, Stuart Brown even contacted the person who most likely started the whole legend.
Should there be a section about the game's prevalence in things like webcomics? (For example, I only learned of this because it is part of the story in the webcomic 'addictive science') 0w0 catt0s ( talk) 04:11, 28 June 2020 (UTC)
There should be a reference to 2020 film "Ashens and the Polybius Heist", a comedy film where the characters search for the titular Polybius video game. https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9170580/ 71.245.67.247 ( talk) 02:21, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
All,
Polybius is an urban legend and I feel like basically all of the happenings to this urban legend in the past few years are not mentioned on this page. There are three movie projects featuring or referencing Polybius that were released in 2020 that are no longer on the page. There was an info dump with an 80+ page US House of Representatives hearing on Polybius (which is likely fake but it is far more substantial and substantive than the various rumors referenced here). No offense to Rogue Synapse but their definition of the urban legend has now been challenged by multiple sources and all of the edits I see from the past year or two are now deleted or reverted.
To be frank, this article needs a new format and a re-write from fresh eyes. To ignore all of the current "discoveries" or references related to the urban legend in a Wikipedia page about the urban legend makes the page misleading. I would volunteer to tackle the project but it seems extremely likely that any work put into this page will be deleted.
Please advise.
— Preceding unsigned comment added by Arcadephreak ( talk • contribs) 16:34, 21 December 2020 (UTC)
None of the sources on this page are reliable and the page is a complete wreck. Just because a gaming blog does an article on unverified sources does not somehow permit the unverified sources to be used as fact on this page. There are now four or five corroborated events related to Polybius that have been deleted or removed from the page. There is a US House of Representatives document that is not cited or sourced. This article is junk now.
In the Netflix animated series Inside Job, a Polybius game appears in an "employees only" arcade, at a organization responsible for managing government conspiracies. Appearance is in season 1, episode 2, 4m50s into the episode. I don't know how to cite something like this since it would be flagged as "original research." Would go in the "popular culture" section. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2601:600:877F:BF00:B52F:A2E1:126B:AFD2 ( talk) 19:47, 28 November 2021 (UTC)
I’ve removed the following as original research, since that’s literally what it was:
although no such copyright has ever been registered. [1]
If there’s a reliable source we can cite as making the same negative claim, it should be restored with that source instead. — 151.132.206.250 ( talk) 18:45, 5 October 2022 (UTC)
[the game’s namesake was] known for his assertion that historians should never report what they cannot verify through interviews with eyewitnesses. [2]
Polybius begins his history proper with the 140th Olympiad because accounts of the remote past amount to hearsay and do not allow for safe judgements (διαλήψεις) and assertions (ἀποφάσεις) regarding the course of events.... he can relate events he saw himself, or he can use the testimony of eyewitnesses. ([footnote 34:] Pol. 4.2.2: ἐξ οὗ συµβαίνει τοῖς µὲν αὐτοὺς ἡµᾶς παραγεγονέναι, τὰ δὲ παρὰ τῶν ἑωρακότων ἀκηκοέναι.)(archive URLs: full text, abstract & journal citation)
...had an episode dedicated to this, probably a worthy inclusion in the pop culture section. 137.118.200.132 ( talk) 03:51, 26 October 2022 (UTC)
Many Polybius cabinets actually still exist today, but that is not mentioned. Goofyahadude1013p310 ( talk) 17:59, 24 January 2023 (UTC)
@ Greenboi123: I see that you wish to add Stuart Brown (Ahoy) to the article as a reliable source. Do you have any source (aside from him) that could establish such credibility? I found a Kotaku article that mentions him but I do not believe it is enough. It also does not go into detail on his research, which I feel it appropriate to say is self-published.
Edit: The Kotaku article cites Wikipedia, which makes me worry about A. circular references and B. their investigative techniques. Tireauclaire ( talk) 21:52, 4 May 2023 (UTC)
@
LooneyLoaiza: Per
WP:BRD I have again removed the addition of the The Simpsons entry in the "In popular culture" section per
MOS:POPCULT, which says A source should cover the subject's cultural impact in some depth; it should not be a source that merely mentions the subject's appearance in a movie, song, television show, or other cultural item.
The
source used for that entry is very much a passing mention of Polybius being shown on The Simpsons. The source says nothing about the appearance on The Simpsons as being culturally impactful in any way, and the only thing that source verifies is that The Simpsons made a passing reference to Polybius in the background of one scene in one episode. That is precisely the type of
WP:TRIVIA that
MOS:POPCULT seeks to avoid and why it was reverted. -
Aoidh (
talk) 12:36, 7 June 2023 (UTC)
What is this description of this article named "the storm is coming"? 50.53.66.139 ( talk) 21:43, 16 January 2024 (UTC)