With the multitude of subjects and popularity of theSuper Mario franchise, it can sometimes be difficult to find the right way to name an article. Generally, the best source for naming will come from the game itself, but when subjects are not named within the actual game or the subject doesn't appear in video games at all, you may need to turn to secondary sources for an official name.

Naming an article

There are several steps to follow when naming an article:

• The Super Mario Wiki is an English language wiki, so the name of an article should correspond to themost commonly used English name of the subject, which, given our user and visitor demographics, means theNorth American name. For example, the North American title of "Mario Strikers Charged" takes precedence over the PAL region's "Mario Strikers Charged Football" title.
• If a subject isn't released in North America, but is released in another English-speaking region (i.e. Europe or Australia), the name they provide should be used for the article. If there is a conflict of which source to use, the region where the game was released first will have priority (i.e. thefirst international English name will be used).
• If there is no official English name, then thefirst international name from a non-English region is used. For example, theChoropū Men'iwa fromSuper Mario-kun do not have an official English name. Being the only official source to give this subject a name, this is the title used. However, if an official English name is found, then the article is moved to that title.
• If a subject's name has changed over time, the more commonly used modern name should be used as the title, rather than the historic name. For example,Princess Peach's original English name was "Princess Toadstool", however, she is usually called "Princess Peach" in recent games, so the article's title is "Princess Peach".
• If there is no official name in any language, then aconjectural title is developed if the subject is notable enough for an article. For example, the unnamed mayor ofFahr Outpost inPaper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door has been given the conjectural yet straightforward name "Fahr Outpost mayor", as he plays a role in the game's story, unlikemost NPCs, which are not granted conjecturally named articles.
• When naming an article, donot use game abbreviations. (e.g. useBully (Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time) as opposed toBully (M&L:PIT)).

Acceptable sources for naming

This is a list of acceptable sources when it comes to naming an article. If a source is not present, keep moving down the list until you have found the right way to name the article, and only create a conjectural title as a last resort.

1. Name provided in-game or in the enclosed instruction manual – Ideally, the subject is named in the game itself, but whatever instruction material is enclosed with the game is also considered a primary naming source. If there is inconsistency between the manual and the game itself regarding a name, the game's version takes precedence.
2. Name from an official Nintendo-hosted website – A name as it appears on the website of an official Nintendo-hosted domain such asthe home ofSuper Mario, a game'sofficial site, or theMario Portal (includingalt text). If there are any name conflicts, then the Nintendo of America website takes priority.
3. Name from a Nintendo Player's Guide or a Prima Games guide fromSuper Mario Galaxy onward – A name from a Nintendo Player's Guide (also commonly known as aNintendo Power guidebook) is an acceptable alternative. For games released after 2007, this source can no longer be used since this source is currently discontinued.Super Paper Mario is the last game in theSuper Mario franchise to be covered byNintendo Power. AfterNintendo Power's sales to Future Publishing in 2007, Nintendo of America signed an exclusive agreement with publisherPrima Games for the rights to official English Nintendo strategy guides. As such, Prima guides released starting withSuper Mario Galaxy are considered to occupy the same tier of officiality asNintendo Power.
4. Name from a pre-Super Mario Galaxy Prima Games Strategy Guide or any other third-party guide – A name from an officially-licensed Prima Games Strategy Guide (when they were published concurrently withNintendo Power) is also an acceptable alternative, though in case of contradictions, theNintendo Power name takes priority. This also applies to other official third-party guides by companies such as Bradygames. For Japanese names, guides published byShogakukan (Nintendo's official guidebook licensee) take priority over other publications.
5. Name used in officially licensed media – A name from any officially Nintendo-licensed non-video game media source. This includes cartoons, movies, magazines, comics, and miscellaneous web content (e.g. an X post, and including alt text).
6. Development name or name from internal data – Any name used in relation to the development of a video game or other Nintendo-licensed media source. This type of name usually comes from internal game files, unused data, developer interviews, or development documents. An exception is internal names for music, which are often generic or challenging to decipher and therefore unsuitable sources for musical theme articles.
7. English translation of the Super Mario Bros. Encyclopedia – The wiki initially banned citations of the EnglishSuper Mario Bros. Encyclopedias due to concerns about circular sourcing. As names first used in the EnglishSuper Mario Bros. Encyclopedia started appearing in other sources, this was later amended to having it being acceptable to cite if there is no other known English name for the subject. If an English name from any of the other tiers listed above exists, it takes priority over the SMBE name.
8. Name derived from a filename on a Nintendo-hosted website – A name from an image file on a website run by Nintendo such asPlay Nintendo or game promotion websites. As filenames are not directly shown to users of websites, the names of image files do not need to follow proper naming conventions. This can lead to names whichcontain typos or other oddities. Should an alternate name for a subject originate from a filename, it should be mentioned using theinternal names template or as trivia.

Please note thatregardless of the source, theofficial North American name takes priority, followed by thefirst international English name if no North American name is available, and finally thefirst international non-English name if no English name is known. For example, if a subject is given a name in-game in the Japanese version only, and not in the English localization of the game, but an English strategy guide names it, that English name is used, rather than the Japanese.

Please also note that general and lengthy descriptions of a subject that are clearly not intended as the subject's name are not suitable sources for the article's title. For example, while straightforward titles like "giant spike block" are fine, if the object is described as a "large block with spikes" or "the block with spikes on them", that should not be the name of the article.

For subjects that originate from other franchises and appear in crossovers with theSuper Mario franchise that are not named in theSuper Mario-related media, an official name from the franchise the subject originated from, derived from similar sources to those listed above, may be used to title the article instead.

English and non-English sources

English regions on the Super Mario Wiki are defined as regions where the games are officially released in the English language, and commonly includes the American, European, and Australian regions. Non-English sources on the Super Mario Wiki are defined as regions where games are not officially released in the English language (but whichare released in one or more other languages). English sources generally have priority over non-English sources, with non-English titles only being used when no official English name is available. The region where the game was released first provides the name, meaning Japanese is often used for the title.

Japanese

See also:MarioWiki:Japanese

Rather than using the actual Japanese characters, we useromanizations, such asItsunomanika Heihō (for 「いつのまにかヘイホー」) orUnibō (for 「ウニボー」). However, if a Japanese word is itself a transliteration of an English word, simply use the original English word. Similarly, names that were transcribed slightly differently from the proper romanization when the games were translated from Japanese to English should use those official transcriptions (i.e. "Yosshī"/"Yossy" and "Kuppa" should be written as "Yoshi" and "Koopa", respectively). Therefore, 「ヨッシーのクッキー クルッポンオーブンでクッキー」 is given the titleYoshi no Cookie: Kuruppon Oven de Cookie, even though the direct romanization is "Yosshī no Kukkī: Kuruppon Ōbun de Kukkī"; another example is 「スーパーマリオ　不思議のころころパーティ」, which is romanized as "Sūpā Mario Fushigi no Korokoro Pāti", but given the article nameSuper Mario Fushigi no Korokoro Party to reflect how users instinctively want to refer to the familiar words in the title. However, if the word is part of a compound, leave it as the original Japanese, as a partial translation would just look awkward, rather than instinctual; for example,Kaibādo (「カイバード」) is not changed to "Kaibird".

Unofficial names

Derived names

If a name can be derived using a combination of a non-English or development name and known information (such as an enemy variant where the base enemy name is known but the variant name is non-English or internal, and we know the meaning of the variant modifier from other uses), then this information should be combined into one name and tagged with {{derivation}}.

Derived namestake precedent over development and non-English names when those derived names are built upon a strong enough foundation, on a case-by-case basis. Any dispute over the composition or usage of a given derived name should be settled through a proposal or consensus-reaching discussion. Derivations should be based on official English localizations or already use English words to begin with. If there isn't precedent for every aspect of the name, then it should remain in its source language.

Conjectural names

See also:MarioWiki:Conjectural names

When a subject has no official name and no means to produce a derived name, then it is given a conjectural name. Generally, conjecturally named subjects don't have articles because they are either not noteworthy enough to have an article or don't have much information to cover. However, subjects that are detailed and noteworthy enough to have articles still have to adhere to certain guidelines.

Conjectural names are usually decided upon by the users of Super Mario Wiki or commonly used names by theSuper Mario fan community. When deciding on a name, the name must be simple yet accurate. For example, the articlePainter has a simple yet accurate title. A name likeHairy Red Painter is not acceptable because it is not simple and has an inaccurate description.

Name changes

In certain cases, names may be changed because the old name is replaced with a newer name. A popular example of this is howBloober was changed toBlooper. In these cases, the newer name will replace the older one with certain exceptions. Exceptions include naming errors, translation errors, and use of aliases/nicknames. For example, if thePrima strategy guide incorrectly namesCrowbers as Crows, Crowber will still be the article name. It is up to the users to find and determine what the naming errors, translation errors, and use of aliases/nicknames are. When mentioning subjects whose names have changed overtime, the newest name generally takes greater priority, except in the context of older media where they went by previous names, in which case those are used instead.

If the subject is from a different franchise that crosses over withSuper Mario, and has since had its name changed outside ofSuper Mario-related media, then only the most recent or commonly used name following the policy above from crossovers with theSuper Mario franchise is used as the article's title rather than the newest overall name.

Formatting

Capitalization

Articles and categories are titled usingsentence case. The words in the title must be capitalized the same way they are from the source, unless it is a proper noun. Proper nouns are capitalized no matter how it is in the source. The wiki software makes it so that the first letter of the title is capitalized regardless. Exceptions to the proper noun rule can be made if there is some special reason why the proper noun is uncapitalized. Also, words that aren't proper nouns in conjectural titles should not be capitalized (likeJunior's mom and dad).

Italics

Italics are used in main and gallery namespace page titles in the same way that they are used in text. This includes cases where parentheses are used in the article title, such asWorld 1-1 (New Super Mario Bros. 2). Adding italics can be accomplished using the {{italic title}} template. See the template page for usage instructions.

Shared titles

It is possible to come across a subject which shares the same title as another subject, in which case identifiers must be used to show which one of the same-named subjects is covered in each page.

If there is one subject that is clearly more likely to be searched for or linked to than the other(s), then the prominent subject will keep the original title while the rest use identifiers. For example, the Blooper enemy gets theBlooper name, whereas theWarioWare: D.I.Y. microgame's article isBlooper (microgame). The {{about}} template is added to the plain-titled article to link to the page(s) containing an identifier. If there are three or more additional pages linked from the {{about}} template (i.e.four pages in total including the page with the template) that may be reasonably associated with a particular title, then a disambiguation page is created (with a "disambiguation" identifier) and the article's {{about}} template is updated to link to the disambiguation page instead. For example, theCannonball article is about the projectile weapon, whereasCannonball (disambiguation) links to all relevant uses of the name.

If the subjects are equally likely to be searched for or linked to, then both articles are given identifiers while the plain subject title is made into a disambiguation page, regardless of how many pages share the name (e.g.Antechamber). Likewise, if a redirect could conceivably point to multiple different destinations, with no one article having clear priority, then it is converted into a disambiguation page regardless of how many pages are linked (e.g.Encyclopedia).

Determining the identifier

If an identifier is needed, the text in parentheses is determined by:

1. What type of thing it is (e.g. level, game, character, tennis court). For example,Dribble & Spitz (souvenir) is correct.
   • The identifier "course" is preferred to be used forSuper Mario 64-type courses, whereas for something like a golf course, the more-specific "golf course" is used.
   • Location identifiers start out specific but may become more generalized before moving to scenario two. For example,Waluigi Pinball (court) uses the less-specific "court" rather than something like "basketball court" because multiple sports can be played there.
   • The identifier "character" is used when differentiating a character from non-character(s) which share the same name (e.g.Ninja (character)). If a character shares the same name as another character, the title of the game or series they appear in is used (e.g.Lily (Paper Mario)). If a character name is used more than once within the same game, a species or custom identifier is used (e.g.Slim (Pixl)).
2. If the same type of thing shares the same name across multiple games, use each game title as the identifiers. For example,World 1-1 (New Super Mario Bros. 2) andWorld 1-1 (New Super Mario Bros. Wii) are bothlevels from different games. We cannot use "World 1-1 (level)" because we need to differentiate between games.
   • If the subject of the article appears in multiple games in one series, use the series name plus the word "series" instead of a game name as the identifier if the topic(s) of the other article(s) are from different series (e.g.Block Star (Mario Party series)).
   • If two different games share the same title but appear on different consoles and the identifier needs to distinguish between them, the game name and console are used in this format: ({game name} for {console}). This format is only used when necessary for resolving a same-title conflict (e.g.Beach Volleyball (Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games for Wii) andBeach Volleyball (Mario & Sonic at the London 2012 Olympic Games for Nintendo 3DS)) and isnot used when there is no same-title conflict for clarifying which version of a game a subject appears in when there are multiple versions of a game with the same title. In the latter case, such information should be made apparent in the article intro, and infobox if present, rather than the article title (e.g.Gold Medal (Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door)).
3. If the same type of thing shares the same name across multiple games and that name is also used for multiple things within one game, use the game title followed by the type of thing as the identifier. For example,Ghost (Wario Land II enemy). If this scenario occurs, then the other thing which shares the name in the same game should also include the game title (e.g.Ghost (Wario Land II boss)).
4. If multiple subjects in a shared appearance are the same type of thing, a distinguishing feature that differs between them may be used instead. For example,Chap (green) andChap (blue) are both characters inSuper Paper Mario.

Musical theme titles

Due to the more unusual nature of the naming of musical themes, the naming of their articles follows a different set of guidelines in terms of name changes, sourcing, and shared titles, though the steps listed under the "Naming an article" section above, such as English names taking priority, still apply.

In the case of multiple names, the title of the article should be general and accurately represent the theme as a whole. Due to this:

• Rather than using the theme's most recent name (taken from its latest reuse or arrangement), the article should use theoriginal name of the theme. The reason for this is due to the naming of its arrangements (and even reuses) often varying drastically from the original and being less general and more unique or specialized to their corresponding games (for example, "Kickin' the Invincible" fromPaper Mario: Color Splash for "Invincibility BGM").
• If no original name exists, the article should use thenext suitable name selected from one of its other official names (for example, something like "Underwater Theme" or "Underwater BGM"). This may need to be decided via community consensus on a talk page.

Article names for musical themes also prioritize a different set of sources in the following order:

1. Name provided inNintendo Music – Nintendo Music is Nintendo's official app where music from its games is released, giving the tracks official names that can be used as the titles for the articles.
2. Name provided in-game – A name taken from thesound test in the game if it has one, or any other in-game content.
3. Name provided in an official soundtrack

If a name isn't found in one of these three sources, continue through the other sources in the list under the "Acceptable sources for naming" section on the off chance one of them has a name before resorting to a conjectural name (with the exception of internal names, as explained in the section).

In the event of themes sharing the same names, as significance of themes is more subjective than regular articles, all themes takeequal priority, even if one may be more significant than the other (for example,Ground BGM (Super Mario Bros.) andGround BGM (Super Mario World) both use identifiers).

Technical restrictions

It is entirely possible for subjects to have titles that are restricted due to MediaWiki software limitations. For this reason, if an article has a title which is technically restricted, then the article should be located at the title which matches the correct title as closely as possible with the {{title}} template used to correct title heading. For example, the first castle level inSuper Mario World, "#1 Iggy's Castle", is instead located at1 Iggy's Castle, as the "#" symbol will redirect readers back to themain page.

• Writing guidelines