quote:Originally posted by Harry: Yes, but I have the idea that "approved" means nothing more then "we need to have x% of your money".
[ June 23, 2001: Message edited by: Harry ]
Every game developer who did a Trek game will tell you its not as simple like that. Ship designs, weapons, bases, etc,. have to be submitted individually to Paramount. Many designs tend to be rejected and has to be submitted as much as five to six times before Paramount would even approve them. Paramount could reject a design or concept stating that it may look a bit too Klingon and less Borg for example.
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Jeff: No... the colony-shuffling that would give rise to the Maquis was set in motion by the Cardassian-Federation treaty which was signed a few months before "The Wounded," two years before "Emissary." The actual handover of worlds back-and-forth might have been a phased process concluding somewhere into DS9's second season. Interestingly, "neutral space" or something to that effect was mentioned in Ensign Ro.. perhaps this had something to with a phased boundary realignment.
Crobto: I think you're deluding yourself if you think Paramount approval is a drawn-out-process intended to make stuff creatively synched to the show. It's more a "let's make sure the programmers didn't totally misrepresent the Trek universe and therefore negatively impact the marketability of the franchise as a whole." Game approval is by no means even influenced by the creative dept. of the show, but simply a function of Viacom's marketing dept. In other words, it's probably two or three legally-trained folks with something of an interest in Trek that sit in an office far removed from the Paramount lot and are there to make sure the Borg starbases don't look like Vor'cha class cruisers, to make sure Starfleet isn't operating special green beret forces armed with M-16s, to make sure that Picard isn't depicted in a game as a blithering idiot, but not to make sure that the boundaries as depicted in a game are supported by the views of the production staff and the scripts.
[ June 23, 2001: Message edited by: The_Tom ]
-------------------- "I was surprised by the matter-of-factness of Kafka's narration, and the subtle humor present as a result." (Sizer 2005)
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Tom, you are deluding yourself even more to think that you can create a feasible map based on "aligning" with scripts on the show. Trek scripting, with so many independent writers,doing last minute changes, with no synch with each other, and you would think that the first thing in their minds to be concerned with cartographic consistency? Phoeey. That's why there is no "canon" map and there never will. I've seen some fan maps attempted to be done and they all tend to vary greatly in interpretation, which tells you the script basing can be such loose ground for building a consistent cartography. Many supposed maps even put Earth midway or way too deep inside the Galactic spiral arm, assuming because it has such a central role in the Federation. (In reality, Earth is towards the edge of the Milky Way Galaxy.)
The DW map can't be canon because there is never a canon map, but fan assumptions of the cartography and their maps are even worst and even more poorly supported. They only probably toss this map in to get the "general feel" of the area, and that's about the best any map can do.
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Maps aside, I tend to agree with The Tom's interpretations on the Cardie-Fed war. Except perhaps for the Klingon aid part - Bashir claimed there had been 20 years of peace prior to "Way of the Warrior", and was obviously referring to Klingon-Cardassian peace here. Any aid the Klingons would give in a war that formally only ended in 2366 would thus have to be really covert. The Romulans of course gave aid to the Cardassians, as per "Dax", but even that probably wasn't too significant. I like something like the stuff in "A Stitch in Time"...
Also, I doubt Bajor held any out-system planets at all at any point of its pre-Occupation history. The society was described as one without the curiosity needed for exploration, and one in peace with itself and in no need for expansion. Exile on faraway planets was a horror to the people in "Ensign Ro". Colonization would only come to play in the aftermath of the Occupation that changed the mentality of the Bajorans in major ways.
The "wars", plural, thing would indeed seem to indicate a now-on, now-off affair where neither side pressed for a final showdown. Instead, the war was allowed to wind down on its own during the run of TNG, until the dust had settled enough for an actual peace agreement to be signed.
If the Cardassians really settled for an outcome that left their enemies mere 5.25 ly from their homeworld, the I'd have to declare them the factual losers of the war. I'd even speculate that there were several attempts at peace during these "wars", but all ended in repeated Cardassian aggressions because the borders were drawn in a way that did not satisfy them.
Thus, the wars really were "border wars" in every sense of the words, and it becomes understandable that the Federation would go to rather extreme lengths to get the border arrangements right in the final, 2367 treaty. The Feds would not press for the handing over of Bajor since that would tick off the Cardassians once again - and they would still have enough spit in them to be dangerous, especially if the fighting was to take place that close to their home turf. "Chain of Command" would be the first indication that the Cardassians were actually far weaker than they seemed, and that their homefront was beginning to crumble - so the Feds would now dare move into Bajor, although tentatively at first.
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