I understand your points but I respectfully disagree. 'Canon' is the material created by the original authors.
If they choose to alter that (such as Twilight 1st edition to 2nd edition), that is their right as the originators of the material.
I am not saying canon doesn't change nor am I saying it should never change.
What I am saying is that if you are not the original author of the material or you do not have the approval of the original author, then you are not producing material that is canon
Whether anyone likes it or not, the people from 93 Games Studio have every right to regard their work as canon material for a third edition of Twilight: 2000 because they actually obtained permission to do so from the people who hold the intellectual property rights.
As I alluded to before, any equipment programmes that originated before the end of 1996 (I must confess that I have never paid much attention to 1st edition as I was introduced to the game through 2nd edition) are all perfectly feasible for inclusion if they fit into the gameworld as described in 'canon'. Anything from after the war was finishing is not really suitable because the world has lost most of its research/development and manufacturing abilities let alone the transportation and organizational ability required to obtain the necessary resources.
Again going to the example of the G36, it was designed in the mid 1990s as a replacement for the failed project to replace the G3 with the G11. By the 'canon' timeline, the G11 was accepted because the events in the gameworld did not replicate events in the real world. Therefore the reasons for creating the G36 do not actually exist within the gameworld.
This is exactly why 'canon' can only compose the original material produced by the author or material that is authorised by the author. Anything else, no matter how fitting or appropriate, is a supplement.
Lets forget about any talk of legal definitions or intellectual property rights here, we are talking about a fundemental principle of acknowledging who produced the original material and exactly what that material is irrespective of if we set about modifying to suit our own tastes.
I cannot simply change the Mona Lisa because I think the painting isn't suitable for modern tastes because her clothes are out of date and then pass it off as the author's original work and as such WE, because we are not the original authors of Twilight: 2000, are not now the makers of canon simply because the timeline is outdated or doesn't fit modern history or because the company who produced it no longer exists.
The Twilight: 2000 canon has already been established by the originators of the material, anything we produce now is a supplement or an alternative and that remains constant regardless of the game being a dead system or not. To claim that something we produce now is canon simply because the game is no longer produced is perilously close to claiming we are the makers of the original product.
|