The tag implication #34201 lombax -> alien has been rejected.

Reason:

EDIT: The tag implication lombax -> alien (forum #296748) has been rejected by @Millcore.

While this is technically correct, it's hard to say whether or not the implication lombax -> alien would/should count for a series where all of the included species are technically aliens (or robots, or in some cases experiments like the protopets). I think the main question to ask first is whether all of the typically alien species in ratchet_and_clank should count as aliens, or whether none of them should count as aliens. I think answering that question will give a good indication on whether or not this implication should be approved.

It would also be a good idea to include an argument in the Reason: section for why you think a particular alias/implication suggestion should be approved. This usually helps to give folks an idea why a suggested alias/implication is a good idea. Even including a brief reason can be more helpful than including no reason at all. Hopefully this was helpful for anybody reading this! :)

The wiki for alien specifies that "this tag should only be added if the creature looks like an alien by twys". They look a bit funky, but I wouldn't call them alien.

strikerman said:
The wiki for alien specifies that "this tag should only be added if the creature looks like an alien by twys". They look a bit funky, but I wouldn't call them alien.

what does an alien "look like", though? that's kind of vague, and there's so many different completely distinct looking alien creatures that are all tagged alien.

darryus said:
what does an alien "look like", though? that's kind of vague, and there's so many different completely distinct looking alien creatures that are all tagged alien.

I take it to mean that the species in question is... well, alien, like it doesn't look like it came from planet Earth. If I can point to it and say "that's just a cat with big ears", then I wouldn't tag it w/ alien.

strikerman said:
I take it to mean that the species in question is... well, alien, like it doesn't look like it came from planet Earth. If I can point to it and say "that's just a cat with big ears", then I wouldn't tag it w/ alien.

I mean, there's already a few things that imply alien already that don't look all _that_ alien or, at the very least they don't really look any _more_ alien than the all of the stuff on here that dosn't get tagged alien.

also, we don't see walking, talking bipedal cats on earth or man torso welded onto where the neck of a horse would go, or small human with wings. "alien" is a relative term.

The tag implication lombax -> alien (forum #296748) has been rejected by @Millcore.

strikerman said:
I take it to mean that the species in question is... well, alien, like it doesn't look like it came from planet Earth. If I can point to it and say "that's just a cat with big ears", then I wouldn't tag it w/ alien.

What about cat-like aliens? Since alien essentially means "belonging or relating to another person, place, or thing", whether something is alien depends on the scope you're referring to; someone from out of town is alien, someone from another country is alien, someone from another planet is alien, regardless of what they look like.

The wiki says it "should only be added if the creature looks like an alien by twys," so what visual traits must one have to be properly tagged as alien by TWYS? That's never specified. As it is, the alien wiki lists things like "Reptillians" (aka lizardmen), cabbit (cat+rabbit hybrid), and orks as aliens, so going by visual traits, lizard anthros, cat+rabbit hybrids, and green-skinned humanoids should be tagged alien. What makes turian an alien but not khajiit? Why's troll_(homestuck) an alien, but not mizutsune? They're all species that don't originate on Earth, are creatures designed with aspects of real animals but aren't themselves real animals, etc.

Given the vast array of designs for animal people, creatures, monsters, demons, etc, I don't see where or how "alien" could reasonably fit with TWYS. Seems to me that alien should be an invalid tag. Or at least be disambiguated, suggesting the common species that's meant by it (roswell grey, xenomorph, etc).

watsit said:
Given the vast array of designs for animal people, creatures, monsters, demons, etc, I don't see where or how "alien" could reasonably fit with TWYS. Seems to me that alien should be an invalid tag. Or at least be disambiguated, suggesting the common species that's meant by it (roswell grey, xenomorph, etc).

This is exactly why I've tried saying before that certain species tags should have lore variants. That way if something doesn't look like an alien, it can still be tagged as one without technically breaking TWYS. I honestly feel the same way about things like:

• Deities (what's a deity even supposed to look like anyways? Same with demigods)
• Fox spirits (so people have a tag they can use when their multi-tail fox doesn't comply with the actual fox_spirit tag)
• Demons (a demon can look like anything and doesn't need horns, wings, or a spade tail)
• Spirits (again, can look like anything)
• Weres (even werewolf itself mentions how difficult it can be to differentiate between a werecreature and just a normal anthro).

You could probably add minotaurs to that list, too, seeing as how there's no real way to differentiate it from any other non-feral bull creature.

All of these tags can be very vague and hard to pin down in a visual medium unless they take on all of the tropes and stereotypes that go with them (full moons, torn clothing, and a "wilder" expression for weres, or very well known deities like Amaterasu or Anubis in the case of deities, just as two examples). There's probably other similar tags floating about that can be vague or hard to use via strict TWYS.

The species tags could remain for those that actually visually look like what they're meant to be, while the lore tags could exist for those who do not. Which might help with searching, if someone knows a specific character is meant to be an alien or whatever else, but don't remember the character's name (or perhaps in the cases where the character doesn't have a tag yet).

At least, that's my thoughts on the matter, but I don't see to many other people ever talk about it, so I don't know if this would even be wanted, or needed.

vulkalu said:
That way if something doesn't look like an alien, it can still be tagged as one without technically breaking TWYS.

What would classify as an alien in that case? As mentioned before, the term "alien" just refers to something "belonging or relating to another person, place, or thing". It's a question of scope beyond that. If it's "a creature/species not from Earth", quite a lot would classify, especially for settings that don't take place on Earth (Luke Skywalker is an alien). If it's "a creature/species that doesn't look like something from Earth", there's no reason certain depictions of spirits or cryptids wouldn't classify for that (if a wookiee is an alien, why isn't a yeti?).

watsit said:
What would classify as an alien in that case?

That's the problem: I don't know where to draw the line on these things. And it's entirely possible my reasoning is flawed. I can't really explain everything I'd consider an alien. I know that when I see something like a xenomorph, or the zerg, that they look like aliens. But then I look at the Avians or Florans from Starbound and all I see are anthro birds and plants; yet, they are aliens in their universe. Again, I don't know where to draw the line on these sorts of things, and I'm probably the worst person to ask because I am terrible at conveying what's going on in my head.

I just felt like lore tags would help for finding specific characters, or in the case of things like "fox spirits"--the sheer number of times I've seen someone complain that their character isn't tagged as a "kitsune", or can't even be tagged as fox_spirit in a specific picture because they just look like any other multi-tailed fox. That maybe it'd help at least mildly remedy situations like that? I don't know. Maybe that's just me, and I just have some weird logic going on here.