Talk:Frog (Yoshi's Story)

Re-merge with Frog

This talk page section contains an unresolved talk page proposal. Please try to help and resolve the issue by voting or leaving a comment.

Current time: Monday, June 17, 2024, 06:00 GMT

1. Their Japanese name is simply derived from generic frog onomatopoeia. It's like calling cats "meows" or cows "Moo Moos"; doesn't necessarily mean they're something different from the run-of-the-mill frog, cat, or cow. Croaks are such intrinsic aspects of a frog that the "geko" name can easily be interpreted as a metonym for the animal.
2. There is nothing in their appearance and behavior that sets them apart from generic frogs. They leap and soak in water, not unlike real frogs.
3. Apparently, the only source of their Japanese name is a licensed guide. Even if said guide were to give them a more "special" name, like "Jungle Frog" or "Cute Frog" or w/e, we don't know if it's also what the developers or the designer of this enemy envisioned and it feels deceptive to assume authority from a guide just because it's written in the same language as the game's original localization.

Frog Pirate is in a strikingly similar situation, but I'll let that be handled in another discussion. (I wouldn't mind a merger for that either.)

Proposer: Koopa con Carne (talk)
Deadline: June 7, 2024, 23:59 GMT

Support

1. Koopa con Carne (talk) ribbit
2. Super Mario RPG (talk) Has nothing to set itself apart from regular frogs.
3. Mario (talk) These don't have anything going for them to distinguish them from other frogs. I opposed splitting this to begin with. The other Yoshi's Story enemies? Meh.
4. Ray Trace (talk) Per all. This frog looks and acts generic and I think would be better off inside a general frog article without a messy identifier.

Oppose

1. Blinker (talk) Plenty of Mario enemies are pretty much regular animals named after onomatopoeias (sometimes not even that). Scaredy Rat looks like a regular cartoony rat, it simply scurries along the ground like one, and its Japanese name is basically just "Squeaksqueak". If it was called just "rat" in English, would you support treating it as a generic rat? And what about Swoop? Or Cheep Cheep? Or Bowbow? Or Preying Mantas? Or Bumblebee? And I'm not even getting into enemies that don't have a page for the animal they're based off, like Maw-Ray, Clampy, Goonie. Also, the guide that gave the "Frog" name also calls a jellyfish enemy "jellyfish", a clam enemy "clam" and a bagworm enemy "spider", so I don't think it using a generic animal name for this frog means all that much.
2. Nintendo101 (talk) Per Blinker. I generally do not like this trend of lumping subjects together with discrete Japanese names because they are perceived as "generic".
3. Pseudo (talk) Per all. I don't see any reason to perceive this as a generic frog and not an enemy designed for the game, any more than say Porcupo.
4. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) - Per (except the part about Preying Mantas)
5. Hewer (talk) Per all, it feels like too much of a stretch to merge this based on its name and behaviour not being creative enough.
6. EvieMaybe (talk) per all
7. DrippingYellow (talk) Per Nintendo101 in the comments in particular. I'd like to see proof that gēko is a common descriptor of frogs in general and not a corruption of a real word used as a name, even if it is "obvious" enough that the Luigi's Mansion 2 frog coincidentally ended up with the same Japanese name. The reason I supported keeping the LM2 frog merged lied partly in its comparitively smaller role (regular pest VS. enemy with unique behavior that a few of the stage's challenges are designed around), as well as the fact that the game being developed by a Canadian company casts doubt on the faithfulness of the Japanese name to the developers' intent.

Comments

@Blinker If you read my proposal carefully you may notice that not once have I used the English name as an argument for the merge. I didn't even bring it up as an aside. Furthermore, the "generic onomatopoeic name" argument isn't the cornerstone of my proposal like you're making it out to be, but it does serve to reinforce other traits of this subject that I believe do not constitute enough grounds for a split page. The proposal's evidence that Frog (Yoshi's Story) is just a regular frog is conveyed through the cumulation of arguments, rather than just each argument on its own. Most of your examples of enemies with generic identification across the series do not enjoy that set of circumstances:

• Cheep Cheeps are obviously a fanciful creature based on fish that have wings for fins, which they use to briefly hover in mid-air besides swimming. Only one family of fish in the real world exhibits a similar behavior, and they look nothing like Cheep Cheeps besides both being fish. In contrast, Yoshi's Story frogs look merely like cartoon frogs, jump like frogs, move through water like frogs. You can argue that no real frogs can cause harm through sheer force, though on that note I don't personally believe jellyfish should be split because they sometimes hurt you and sometimes don't.
• Clampies aren't non-descript clams, they are specifically identified in Japanese as this thing. That alone merits an article separate from clam.
• There isn't even a generic "dog" article Bowbows could me merged with.
• Goonies and Scaredy Rats are more closely based on real world animals, but, like Bowbow, they don't even have truly generic counterparts in the Mario series that they could be merged to on the wiki ("albatross" is a mis-identification of seagull, "rat" redirects to Sewer Rat; and no, mice aren't rats.). Even if they had, they have become integral and recurring parts of the Mario franchise (in Goonie's case, the Yoshi slice of the pie) that one could argue that treating them as generic albatrosses and rats would be construed as counterintuitive even with the lang-of-origin names in mind. They also tend to have creative names in multiple other languages that aren't squarely "squeaksqueak" or something of that ilk, and also come from sources of authority, like a game, not just a licensed guide.
• Swoops are named in Japanese after the sound of wings flapping, which doesn't even relate to bats specifically, so I don't see your point here.

Other arguments in your vote hinge on "the wiki already does this thing" which is a fallacy. Some of the subjects you brought up ought to be, in fact, treated differently than they are currently.

• Preying Mantas are not only called "jellyfish" in multiple Japanese guides from different times (as opposed to just one, which makes it more likely it is meant to be perceived as a generic jellyfish), there's nothing in their behavior that indicates some distinction from the real thing and the only strikingly fantastical liberty in their design is the pair of eyes, which Template:Media link. Seeing as the Template:Media link of its English name tends to be quite whimsical in the naming of YI creatures, which has been thoroughly argued to be of little relevance to how these creatures are meant to be treated, I think there's enough reason for Preying Mantas to be merged with Jellyfish; so that comparison to Frog (Yoshi's Story) falls apart.
• Bumblebee is just Frog (Yoshi's Story) v2.0.

So yeah. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 09:20, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

It does not matter if the Japanese name was included in the proposal for it to be relevant, because it is often indicative of categorical intent. (i.e. If this enemy was to literally be a frog, and not a derived "type" of frog, they would have given it a different name.) Of course it would be relevant. Personally, I think I would be open to changing my vote if it is demonstrated that Geko is synonymous with Kaeru outside of the Super Mario franchise, among real amphibians. Or at least that there are real frog species sometimes called Geko. A cursory search on my other wiki suggests it is not. (This does not mean examples do not exist, it just means we would have to search for them elsewhere.)

Additionally, and this is tangentially related, I reject the idea that there are any generic subjects in the Super Mario franchise. A seagull is just as derived from real gulls as Goonies, and just as divorced from real-life components of those animals. It is inaccurate to present them as otherwise. - Nintendo101 (talk) 10:01, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

"Name comes from Japanese guides" has been vocally rejected as a reason to change the treatment of a subject. Why is it suddenly used here as a counterargument? At least in Prince Froggy's case, there were multiple guides for different game releases that touted what his perceived identity is, whereas here it's just one.
"Personally, I think I would be open to changing my vote if it is demonstrated that Geko is synonymous with Kaeru"
That's not even remotely the point I'm making. I even acknowledged in the proposal that their Japanese name is based on the onomatopoeia, not the animal itself. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 10:11, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

I honestly don't get the argument that the name being derived from an onomatopoeia somehow harms its legitimacy. It might not be the most creative, sure, but it's still a distinct name. I can't think of any animals that actually are commonly referred to by the sound they make (well, real ones anyway). Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 10:21, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

Well, katydids and coquí frogs are. Still, we ain't merging Chain Chomp (WanWan/BowWow) to a generic dog article just because it acts and sounds like a dog. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 10:30, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

Are you guys willingly ignoring the part where I said that the arguments are meant to be considered as a whole rather than individually, or perhaps everything I just wrote to Blinker?
Of course, obviously, no question about it, a spherical metallic thing isn't gonna be considered a generic dog just because it's called a 'woofwoof' in Japanese. The YS frog is just a cartoon frog with a frog onomatopoeia as its name. It's a frog through and through, aside from the fact that it's a virtual representation of a generic frog. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 10:45, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

And so are most frogs in the extended franchise, like say, Bopping Toady, Jumper, and Frogoon. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 10:52, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

A fictional species of frog that has been established as distinct isn't the same thing as a mere generic virtual frog. A Koopa Troopa isn't the exact same thing as a turtle. But if there was a turtle called "snapsnap" in the franchise, yeah, that would be a turtle. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 11:22, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

I'm not ignoring your comments, I just don't think they're convincing, "considering the arguments as a whole" doesn't change that. Unconvincing argument + unconvincing argument ≠ convincing argument. And yeah, being a cartoon version of a real animal is common among characters in this franchise. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 10:58, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

You're simplifying it by choosing to just focus on one argument or the other and judging them only on their own merits. You may want to take a look at what "cumulative evidence" means.
A thing in Mario games having an animal sound as a name doesn't mean they are that animal--see Chain Chomp. I agree with that. However, if "ribbit", a sound intrinsically associated with frogs, is used as the name of a virtual frog that acts like a generic frog, there's little sense to consider it a wholly different concept from Frog. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 11:22, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

My issue with the actual arguments presented is that they require modifiers with subjective interpretation, not anything concrete.

1. requires accepting that names derived from onomatopoeias (not even literal onomatopoeias, but original names derived from them) can be considered metonyms for real-world subjects. Why? The equivalent here is not having a frog enemy named "ribbit" - it is having one named "Ribby" or "Croaky". This has not really been substantiated, and it is important considering the second argument necessitates accepting this one as "true".
2. requires accepting that this enemy is a "generic frog", and I frankly don't know what that means. Like Doc mentioned, a number of enemies look like cartoony frogs, and this one in particular does not look any more derived from its real-world counterparts as the other enemies from Yoshi's Story, like the aforementioned clam, "spider", etc. Clearly derived from a frog, but still unsure what makes it more "generic" from its amphibious peers in the franchise. This is because it necessitates agreeing that a frog enemy named "Ribby" is essentially the same as a frog enemy named "frog". A good argument hasn't been made on why we should.
3. requires we undervalue Shogakukan guides as trustworthy references for subjects that we subjectively perceive as generic. Again, why? I wasn't involved with the Prince Froggy proposal, but regardless of anything said there, I personally have little reason to think a name that came from a Shogakukan guidebook was not provided by Nintendo themselves. They are closer partners with Nintendo Co., Ltd. than Nintendo of America ever was with Prima Games. This also inherently weakens the first argument, because if "Geko" really could just mean "frog", it would not matter if it appeared in the guidebook.

This is why I offered the equation of Geko to Kaeru in real-life amphibian literature, because that would be supportive of the merge you're trying to make, more so than any of the actually proposed arguments, whether understood cumulatively or otherwise. - Nintendo101 (talk) 12:16, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

1. There's next to zero artistic license in prolonging the "e" in "geko". "Gēko" is not, in fact, comparable to "croaky". It's literally just "ribbit". Heck, even if this enemy was actually named "croaky", I'm not gonna pretend like that determines it is distinct from a Frog because that's what frogs do: they croak. I'd probably still motion to have it merged back.
2. To elaborate slightly what I said to Doc above, there's a world of difference between an otherwise generic frog being identified as "Goon frog" or "energetic (bopping) toad" and one named "ribbit-ribbit" or even the slightly more cutesy "croaky". Frogs aren't inherently goons, and toads are actually known for being more sedentary than boppy. Point is, those two enemies exhibit some degree of creative deviation from actual frogs. That's a concrete basis for having them split.
3. In the same breath as you accusing me of operating on assumption, you're claiming that Shogakukan have the same level of authority on the Mario franchise as Nintendo the company or the game's creators just because Nintendo has an established relationship with this publishing house. You need to provide proof that whoever wrote the guide and used the term "geko" was dictated by their long-time collaborators. -- KOOPA CON CARNE Koopa con Carne (talk) 13:12, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

As I already said, I don't think the arguments become more convincing when considered as a whole. Backing up an unconvincing argument with more unconvincing arguments doesn't help them become convincing. And I never said it was a "wholly different concept" from frogs, but Koopas aren't a "wholly different concept" from turtles. The line between "generic" and not feels far too arbitrary, and I think it takes a few too many assumptions or just weak arguments to classify this one as "generic". Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 12:40, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

I like how "frog that looks and acts like a frog is named after the sound it makes, therefore it's a generic frog" is taken to be an assumption and not extremely basic common sense lmao. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 13:12, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

And Jumper is named after another action frogs do. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 13:16, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

That should be merged as well. It's almost a Preying Manta situation. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 13:23, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

I've already explained to you why I don't think those arguments are convincing, so clearly it's not "extremely basic common sense". For your opinion to be "common sense", it would have to be, uh, common, without a majority disagreeing with it. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 15:41, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

You didn't explain anything, you went off on a tangent about how you can't think of animals that are named after their sound in the real world (which wasn't my point; besides, babytalk is a thing and it's not uncommon to hear a parent point to a cat as "meow meow" for their infant) and then stated how I can't decree something to be a generic subject according to its generic naming, appearance, and behavior. And something about how unconvincing my arguments are (then making no effort to actually counter them.) -- KOOPA CON CARNE 16:09, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

I wouldn't call it a "tangent", your argument that the name's generic because it's an onomatopoeia suggests to me that you think referring to animals as the sound they make is so ubiquitous as to be equivalent to it just being called "frog" in Japanese, with which I disagree ("babytalk" is a stretch, that's still not a usual name for a cat). The name of a cartoon animal character being derived from something closely associated with that animal is nothing unusual, and you using it as an argument feels like arbitrarily deciding it's somehow too uncreative to count as a non-generic name. "Appearance and behaviour" are similarly not great arguments, there's plenty of other examples already mentioned of cartoonish animals that are named and designed after their real life basis. The only difference I see between this case and that of Frogoon is the latter's slightly more creative name. And clearly I did make an effort to counter your arguments, or you'd have had nothing to respond to. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 16:38, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

Calling frogs "ribbits" may not be ubiquitous in actual grown men and women's speech, but it seems toddlers have a higher incidence of linking an animal to its sound than its name: "We suggest that, because onomatopoeia evoke imagery of the referent, children can draw from sensory experience to easily link onomatopoeic words to meaning, both when the referent is present as well as when it is absent.". That's just to hopefully give you academic perspective on a topic that, I repeat, should be inferred through observation and common sense. It's not this otherwordly phenomenon you're making it to be.
If "appearance and behavior" wasn't that important, the LM2, SMO, and Diddy Kong Racing frogs would have long been split between pages. Literally the only thing Yoshi's Story frogs have differently from the other generic frogs is two non-English names, both of which are derived from onomatopoeia of a frog. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 17:23, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

A few things in response:

• When I brought up Maw-Ray, Clampy and Goonie, I specifically pointed out that there are no pages for their real-world equivalents (morays, Akoya pearl oysters and albatrosses). I hadn't realized this applied to dogs as well (I was under the impression that there was a "dog" article). Regardless, the articles covering these enemies do not treat them as though they're the same subject as their real-world counterparts. For example, the Maw-Ray article says "Maw-Rays (...) are moray eels that first appear in Super Mario 64". If they were synonymous, this would be the same as saying "Moray eels are moray eels that first appear in Super Mario 64".
• Regarding Scaredy Rat and the difference between mice and rats, I'll point out that its Chinese name for the enemy calls it a mouse. I called it a rat, the English name calls it a rat, but could be a mouse. Sorry for not explaining earlier.
• I can see the argument for merging Preying Mantas, I just thought it was a relevant example (and wasn't expecting people to want to merge it). So sure, I'll drop that particular example.
• Regarding Swoop, I'm not sure what to make of your counterargument. Yes, "onomatopoeia of wings flapping" isn't exclusive to bats in the way "onomatopoeia of croaking" isn't is exclusive to frogs, but so what? Why is that where you draw the line?
• Finally, regarding the point about other enemies having creative names in multiple languages. We only have one other name for the Yoshi's Story frog. It's the German name "Börki". It's derived from an onomatopoeia, sure, but it's still a name. Unless your argument is that the names aren't as creative or clever as those of Scaredy Rat, in which case, again, why is that where you draw the line?
  The preceding unsigned comment was added by Blinker (talk).

"'Onomatopoeia of croaking' isn't exclusive to frogs": it is, actually, both in English and Japanese. "Caw" (EN) or "Kaa" (JA) is what's used for a crow's croak if that's what you were getting at. (Retracting because what I'm addressing was confirmed to be just a typo.)
"why is that where you draw the line": To reiterate what I've been repeating in the comments, I'm not drawing the line at one singular aspect or another. It's a multitude of traits that, combined, give a Mario species a "generic" or "specific" quality. Scaredy Rats, Goonies, Frogoons, Chain Chomps etc. have things going for them that warrant their current treatment; Yoshi's Story frogs are by all accounts just basic frogs that are being split from the catch-all frog article solely because of a Japanese name that is simply the sound a frog makes and originates from a third-party source. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 14:10, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

Ugh, I made a typo, "is", not "isn't"... Blinker (talk) 14:15, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

Your arguments-in-a-cumulative-fashion can also be used to merge Urchin with any other generic depiction of sea urchin (looks like a cartoon stylized version of a normal sea urchin, normal-sounding name, doesn't really act much different from any other mobile urchin out there), and I don't think we should do that, either. Also, there's a reason the cow and penguin pages removed most unstylized background/cartoon appearances of the generic animal they are a counterpart to. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 12:43, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

If Urchin's lang-of-origin name is not reason enough to keep it split (you're not going to tell me that Unira, "Monster Urchin" is in any way the go-to association a person makes wit sea urchins), then there'd be the obvious fact that Urchins, capital U, purple-with-orange-spikes echinoderms, have established themselves as an icon of Mario's underwater levels and aren't some one-off enemy encountered in a single room in a game from almost 30 years ago. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 13:21, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

I feel like that argument gets dangerously close to the idea of not covering things because we think they're too minor, to which I strongly object. I don't think the enemy's obscurity has much to do with this. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 15:41, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

It's not even remotely close to that. The proposal and my arguments aren't about whether it's worth having this enemy covered or not, it's the way it's being identified. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 16:09, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

That's why I said "close". Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 16:43, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

You know, in all of this arguing, I haven't seen any evidence actually provided for exactly how naming something after the sound it makes or the action it does is synonymous with calling it a generic member of a species. I don't know how it is in Romania, but as someone who speaks English as a first language, in the U.S., it is not "extremely basic common sense" to consider "croak" (or, in the vein of the Japanese name of the subject concerning this proposal, "kuh-roak") a synonym for "frog".
We might call regular real-life frogs "croakers" or "amphibians" or something goofy in conversation, but if a header in a guide has, in big bold letters, "Croak", and the picture below shows a particular frog design, then chances are they named those frogs "Croaks". I'd also like to know what experience you have in Japanese to be able to make these bold, unproven statements. How exactly is there "next to zero artistic license" in extending a syllable in geko? Is it a trend in Japan to informally refer to animals by modified versions of the word for the sound they make? DrippingYellow (talk) 16:17, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

It's a frog named after its croak, dude, ain't that deep. Above I provided a research paper on how young children may identify animals using onomatopoeia, since it's being framed as this unheard of, impossible phenomenon that has no basis in the real world. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 17:23, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

No one said it's an "unheard of, impossible phenomenon", but it's not the norm either, there's more possibilities than the two extremes. You've admitted that using the sound an animal makes as its name is not a normal practice in most contexts, but is a quirk of young children who don't remember the actual name of the animal. Thus, using this unusual name as the actual name of a frog character is decidedly less generic than just calling it "frog". I don't get why you keep saying your own stance is "common sense" - it being what you think clearly doesn't make it what everyone thinks, so it's not common sense at all. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 17:38, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

To be fair, given the artistic direction and target audience of Yoshi's Story, giving characters in the game (including otherwise generic subjects) these types of names would make sense. - Nintendo101 (talk) 17:45, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

^Bingo! The context is there to all but explicitly confirm that using "geko" in reference to a nondescript frog is simply an artistic choice. -- KOOPA CON CARNE 17:51, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

But perhaps not as much sense as just calling it a frog in that case. I feel like the fact that they didn't still shows a degree of distinction equal to that of other enemies like Frogoon, and to conclude otherwise is starting to get a bit speculative. Hewer (talk · contributions · edit count) 17:54, May 24, 2024 (EDT)

What about Sidestepper and crab? After all, the former has been called "crab" on numerous occasions (including being "Kani-san" originally) and isn't much distinct in appearance or behavior either. Doc von Schmeltwick (talk) 00:46, May 25, 2024 (EDT)