with Lila showing up and the borg command ship being V'Ger like it's safe to say Star Trek Legacy story is canon.
But canon as to hat exactly as STO isn't canon for any of the shows/films (unless a show or film mentions something from STO.)
Never played ST: Legacy, but hell, having a story relating to the V'Ger incident is hardly a new thing for any Star Trek game as hell, ST:TMP is 43 years old.
Formerly known as Armsman from June 2008 to June 20, 2012
PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
with Lila showing up and the borg command ship being V'Ger like it's safe to say Star Trek Legacy story is canon.
But canon as to hat exactly as STO isn't canon for any of the shows/films (unless a show or film mentions something from STO.)
Never played ST: Legacy, but hell, having a story relating to the V'Ger incident is hardly a new thing for any Star Trek game as hell, ST:TMP is 43 years old.
well in Legacy. V'Ger made the borg hence why the Borg Command ship ingame looks like the V'Ger ship
with Lila showing up and the borg command ship being V'Ger like it's safe to say Star Trek Legacy story is canon.
But canon as to hat exactly as STO isn't canon for any of the shows/films (unless a show or film mentions something from STO.)
Never played ST: Legacy, but hell, having a story relating to the V'Ger incident is hardly a new thing for any Star Trek game as hell, ST:TMP is 43 years old.
well in Legacy. V'Ger made the borg hence why the Borg Command ship ingame looks like the V'Ger ship
I prefer the race of living machines to remain a mystery. I don't go with the Borg origin thing, plus V'Ger was 300 years old or so, Borg been around for MUCH longer.
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rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,579Community Moderator
I prefer the race of living machines to remain a mystery. I don't go with the Borg origin thing, plus V'Ger was 300 years old or so, Borg been around for MUCH longer.
They never said that the living machines were Borg in Legacy. Voyager 6 was found and repaired by the living machines, but they couldn't understand the simple programming the probe had. I think you're thinking about the Shatner novels, which draw a much more defined connection between V'Ger, the living machines, and the Borg.
Its stated in Legacy that V'Ger created the Borg at first to assist in "learning all that is learnable" or whatever the line was. And when it couldn't find anything else like it, V'Ger decided that the galaxy was infested and the only purpose for humanoid life was assimilation. Also its implied that Voyager 6 fell into a black hole or something, and spat through time to the distant past.
Also STO can't use any material from Legacy anyways because Legacy was made by Bethesda. So its off limits, just like the Cardassian ship designs from Armada 2 because that game was made by Activision.
So would that also mean the worst Borg origin story is now STO canon?
As Rattler pointed out STO cannot use anything substantial from Legacy, minor shout outs sure but nothing more then that so I wouldn't draw any conclusions beyond what's been literally shown on screen. This is what is part of STO story a) Borg have ships that look like V'ger and b) Lt. Illia, a character first introduced in Star Trek: The Motion Picture (released in 1979) is now part of the STO story. Anything beyond that is pure 100% speculation.
So would that also mean the worst Borg origin story is now STO canon?
As Rattler pointed out STO cannot use anything substantial from Legacy, minor shout outs sure but nothing more then that so I wouldn't draw any conclusions beyond what's been literally shown on screen. This is what is part of STO story a) Borg have ships that look like V'ger and b) Lt. Illia, a character first introduced in Star Trek: The Motion Picture (released in 1979) is now part of the STO story. Anything beyond that is pure 100% speculation.
YET the Borg Command ship is V'Ger's ship instyle. and while bethseba made Legacy. Paramount and CBS own the rights so sto can as well
It's a little more complicated. Paramount outright owns the full rights to V'gers ship so anything under license can use it in a way that Paramount approves. If Paramount approves another licensee using it as a Borg ship it's their choice. But they can't lift original ship designs or major story/lore elements from one licensee to another directly. Even if Paramount owns all derivatives. It gets messy. For example to use a ship from one of those other games somewhere else gets into things like creator royalties for derivative uses of their work. Which can get real messy in a Video Game company from decades ago. It's not impossible. Just complicated enough that it will likely never ever happen. Similarly going the other way while they can use ships from STO in the shows, it likely does require a few extra steps, and maybe some payments. Normally I would view this as unlikely, given how masterful Paramount traditionally has been at going above and beyond to avoid paying anybody anything. (see; "Why did Lorcano become Tom Paris?", "Why are their official yet truly horrible lyrics for the Star Trek theme?"). However I see some faint ray of hope there. There are some rumors that the Disco and Live Action teams have sourced many of their not traditional Federation Ships to one or more outside companies that make and sell 3d SciFi models for things like Video Games. Supposedly pretty much all of the 32c ships were sourced that way, and not done in house. If they're going to pay some outside 3d art house anyway for a ship design, there is very little reason not to go through the probably cheaper extra steps to use some STO designs. Even if just for background ships or Easter Eggs.
As far as V'ger and the race of living machines? I'm going to speculate that tying those to the Borg may be on the off limits list at least until the end of Picard season 3. The giant space tentacle monsters might be viewed as having something to do with the race of living machines. Moreso than the Borg.
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rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,579Community Moderator
YET the Borg Command ship is V'Ger's ship instyle. and while bethseba made Legacy. Paramount and CBS own the rights so sto can as well
No. They can't. Because that particular story in Legacy is owned by Bethesda for all intents and purposes. STO belongs to Cryptic, an entirely different company from Bethesda. The situation is exactly the same as getting ships from other games. Unless those original designs are in house, they can't be touched. So we can't get ships like:
Cardassian Hutet - Dominion Wars
Romulan Winged Defender - various (originally a FASA design I believe)
Federation Incursion Class - Away Team/Armada 2
Federation Premonition Class - Armada
Romulan Melak Warbird - New Worlds (brief appearance in the intro)
Klingon K'vorcha Class - Dominion Wars
Those designs are owned by the companies that made those games. Cryptic cannot legally touch those.
CBS owns the IP, yes. However the story of Star Trek Legacy is entirely a product of Bethesda, which was licensed to make that game.
There is no difinitive connection between V'Ger and the Borg. It is one of the fan theories that are out there. And yes while the Unimatrix ships are a direct nod to V'Ger, there is no actual, hard evidence that V'Ger is Borg. Its a nod to the fan theory regarding the origins of the Borg.
Those designs are owned by the companies that made those games. Cryptic cannot legally touch those.
CBS owns the IP, yes. However the story of Star Trek Legacy is entirely a product of Bethesda, which was licensed to make that game.
It can often be a little more complicated than that. Depending on the nature of the licensing contracts Cryptic possibly could use some of those by going through CBS/Paramount. But they would require separate licensing agreements and some payments somewhere. In most cases nobody will be bothered to do that. Why pay somebody else for an old ship design when you can make a new one in house at a cost savings? But every so often it does happen. For example the Titan. Which was designed by Random House. If there is enough impetuous or fan love of a particular design such where it effectively becomes part of the canon, the parties involved may go for it. As using it brings more fan interest and thus consumers than leaving it alone in its little walled off box. Really other than the Titan the only other ships that I see having the strong potential to spring back from a licensor into the greater overall media canon and possible screen use would be the Odyssey aka the Enterprise-F. We've also seen it happen over in Star Wars where some non canon EU/Legacy ship designs find their way cross licensor into games, toys and such.
So can it happen? Sometimes, maybe, with a compelling enough reason. Will it happen? Almost certainly no.
YET the Borg Command ship is V'Ger's ship instyle. and while bethseba made Legacy. Paramount and CBS own the rights so sto can as well
No. They can't. Because that particular story in Legacy is owned by Bethesda for all intents and purposes. STO belongs to Cryptic, an entirely different company from Bethesda. The situation is exactly the same as getting ships from other games. Unless those original designs are in house, they can't be touched. So we can't get ships like:
Cardassian Hutet - Dominion Wars
Romulan Winged Defender - various (originally a FASA design I believe)
Federation Incursion Class - Away Team/Armada 2
Federation Premonition Class - Armada
Romulan Melak Warbird - New Worlds (brief appearance in the intro)
Klingon K'vorcha Class - Dominion Wars
Those designs are owned by the companies that made those games. Cryptic cannot legally touch those.
CBS owns the IP, yes. However the story of Star Trek Legacy is entirely a product of Bethesda, which was licensed to make that game.
There is no difinitive connection between V'Ger and the Borg. It is one of the fan theories that are out there. And yes while the Unimatrix ships are a direct nod to V'Ger, there is no actual, hard evidence that V'Ger is Borg. Its a nod to the fan theory regarding the origins of the Borg.
The FASA designs are in an odd place legally since Paramount put a clause in the license that said they in effect jointly owned anything designed for Star Trek, which means the Winged Defender class (and the Wanderer class which actually appeared in live Trek as a wireframe) are theoretically fair game if CBS decides to allow it.
The problem is that the clause was very questionable at the time and Paramount decided to play it safe and never use anything from FASA in a way that could be challenged by FASA, (which is no longer an active game company but licenses its old game IP to active game companies instead), like using only the wireframe of the Wanderer (and possibly why it was upside-down on the screen) instead of a model.
All in all, it means that it is treated the same as the others anyway, so even those FASA ships are highly unlikely to make an appearance in STO (or even CBS Trek itself).
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rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,579Community Moderator
Yea. The Winged Defender is an oddball. It has appeared in Armada 2 and Legacy, both from different companies. And I kinda wanna say it might have shown up in the Starfleet Command games. However the rest are owned by their respective companies.
YET the Borg Command ship is V'Ger's ship instyle. and while bethseba made Legacy. Paramount and CBS own the rights so sto can as well
No. They can't. Because that particular story in Legacy is owned by Bethesda for all intents and purposes. STO belongs to Cryptic, an entirely different company from Bethesda. The situation is exactly the same as getting ships from other games. Unless those original designs are in house, they can't be touched. So we can't get ships like:
Cardassian Hutet - Dominion Wars
Romulan Winged Defender - various (originally a FASA design I believe)
Federation Incursion Class - Away Team/Armada 2
Federation Premonition Class - Armada
Romulan Melak Warbird - New Worlds (brief appearance in the intro)
Klingon K'vorcha Class - Dominion Wars
Those designs are owned by the companies that made those games. Cryptic cannot legally touch those.
CBS owns the IP, yes. However the story of Star Trek Legacy is entirely a product of Bethesda, which was licensed to make that game.
There is no difinitive connection between V'Ger and the Borg. It is one of the fan theories that are out there. And yes while the Unimatrix ships are a direct nod to V'Ger, there is no actual, hard evidence that V'Ger is Borg. Its a nod to the fan theory regarding the origins of the Borg.
The FASA designs are in an odd place legally since Paramount put a clause in the license that said they in effect jointly owned anything designed for Star Trek, which means the Winged Defender class (and the Wanderer class which actually appeared in live Trek as a wireframe) are theoretically fair game if CBS decides to allow it.
The problem is that the clause was very questionable at the time and Paramount decided to play it safe and never use anything from FASA in a way that could be challenged by FASA, (which is no longer an active game company but licenses its old game IP to active game companies instead), like using only the wireframe of the Wanderer (and possibly why it was upside-down on the screen) instead of a model.
All in all, it means that it is treated the same as the others anyway, so even those FASA ships are highly unlikely to make an appearance in STO (or even CBS Trek itself).
The joint ownership of any and all derivatives is pretty common, and would be in any Star Trek Licensing contract. Paramount can in theory use any ship that has appeared or been created under license. Just because that is almost always how those type contracts work. Plus they learned a few hard lessons when they ran into problems with 3rd party modelers during the TOS days. (Why Romulan's suddenly started buying and flying Klingon D-7's. There was a license issue with the Romulan BOP seen in Balance of Terror, and the builder wanted more money. They did eventually pay him off years later) Putting a derivatives clause into any and all licensing deals became pretty much pro forma by the mid to late 70's. In part because of skeevy dealings by Hollywood production companies. For example The Bionic Woman show was created explicitly to TRIBBLE the author/creator of the Six Million Dollar Man out of his TV royalties.
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rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,579Community Moderator
Still... the issue of legal is in play. Two ship classes in STO fell under that because they only appeared in books, the Luna and Vesta classes. It wasn't until the Luna appeared in Lower Decks that we got any kind of update to the in game Luna. The Vesta was apparently a headache and a half to get permission to put in game.
Still... the issue of legal is in play. Two ship classes in STO fell under that because they only appeared in books, the Luna and Vesta classes. It wasn't until the Luna appeared in Lower Decks that we got any kind of update to the in game Luna. The Vesta was apparently a headache and a half to get permission to put in game.
The Luna is an extra special case. The Luna did not just appear in books. Random House actually commissioned a full Studio Scale 5' filming miniature of the Titan. Which they took on tour to promote the books. I believe they gifted the model and the design rights back to Paramount as part of the marketing agreements. But they did realize a very tangible design of the Titan/Luna class. And it's the same design that appears here and in Lower Decks.
I was actually surprised and a bit excited to see Ilia, but I am too concerned they go the fan theory appeal route and link Borg and V'Ger. Which never made sense. V'Ger is a machine. Borg are not. Forced linking of the two just because they look machiney makes as much sense as treating Saurians, Voth and Gorn as the same species or saying Mirror Soong 'created Borg'.
Besides, obviously the Terrans in STO have conquered the Borg and control them in weaponized mini collectives. What else could they possibly need Ilia for IF the game decides to link her to Borg.
^ Memory Alpha.org is not canon. It's a open wiki with arbitrary rules. Only what can be cited from an episode is. ^
"No. Men do not roar. Women roar. Then they hurl heavy objects... and claw at you." -Worf, son of Mogh
"A filthy, mangy beast, but in its bony breast beat the heart of a warrior" - "faithful" (...) "but ever-ready to follow the call of the wild." - Martok, about a Targ
"That pig smelled horrid. A sweet-sour, extremely pungent odor. I showered and showered, and it took me a week to get rid of it!" - Robert Justman, appreciating Emmy-Lou
While there might be a link it's clear that who ever build V'Ger are not the Borg Collective as the way Janeway talked about Illia's Cybernetic implants pretty much said that the tech was unknown to Starfleet, something Borg tech is not.
Also when Illia beamed back into ENT-nil she beamed in the nude though we only saw a blurry image from behind the privacy screen on the sonic shower before she got clothed and said screen opened, that said we saw enough to suggest that there was no major visible implants hidden by her clothes and she also have the same skin tone she had before capture. By contrast all Borg drones we have seen have highly visible implants (cybernetic ones that is) all over their body, not mention all active drones have had ashen grey skin (that or chalk white skin).
This is not going to be the Borg - it's going to be the Terran Emperor doing something to either subvert the Synth Alliance or doing something to TRIBBLE them off and causing them to invade - without a beacon this time.
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
They are going to subvert our expectations. It's all going to lead back to a planet of Norman type Androids worshiping the Emperor, who will turn out to be the desiccated corpse of Harry Mudd.
YET the Borg Command ship is V'Ger's ship instyle. and while bethseba made Legacy. Paramount and CBS own the rights so sto can as well
No. They can't. Because that particular story in Legacy is owned by Bethesda for all intents and purposes. STO belongs to Cryptic, an entirely different company from Bethesda. The situation is exactly the same as getting ships from other games. Unless those original designs are in house, they can't be touched. So we can't get ships like:
Cardassian Hutet - Dominion Wars
Romulan Winged Defender - various (originally a FASA design I believe)
Federation Incursion Class - Away Team/Armada 2
Federation Premonition Class - Armada
Romulan Melak Warbird - New Worlds (brief appearance in the intro)
Klingon K'vorcha Class - Dominion Wars
Those designs are owned by the companies that made those games. Cryptic cannot legally touch those.
CBS owns the IP, yes. However the story of Star Trek Legacy is entirely a product of Bethesda, which was licensed to make that game.
There is no difinitive connection between V'Ger and the Borg. It is one of the fan theories that are out there. And yes while the Unimatrix ships are a direct nod to V'Ger, there is no actual, hard evidence that V'Ger is Borg. Its a nod to the fan theory regarding the origins of the Borg.
The FASA designs are in an odd place legally since Paramount put a clause in the license that said they in effect jointly owned anything designed for Star Trek, which means the Winged Defender class (and the Wanderer class which actually appeared in live Trek as a wireframe) are theoretically fair game if CBS decides to allow it.
The problem is that the clause was very questionable at the time and Paramount decided to play it safe and never use anything from FASA in a way that could be challenged by FASA, (which is no longer an active game company but licenses its old game IP to active game companies instead), like using only the wireframe of the Wanderer (and possibly why it was upside-down on the screen) instead of a model.
All in all, it means that it is treated the same as the others anyway, so even those FASA ships are highly unlikely to make an appearance in STO (or even CBS Trek itself).
FASA's Star Trek license was revoked by Paramount after their publishing of an unlicensed TNG manual for their Star Trek RPG at the time. FASA thought their license gave them the right to do it; but Paramount disagreed (it also used info from a way earlier version of the series Bible and other information FASA had not obtained directly from Paramount, so yeah, it wasn't 'canon accurate' but they released it BEFORE the first episode of TNG aired too).
Bottom line: FASA agreed to stop publication and distribution; but also as a result, when the Star Trek license came up for renewal, Paramount opted NOT to renew.
But yeah, the company still exists, but shifted focus opting to license out it's owned intellectual properties, in lieu of actually producing or marketing any products themselves; and if there was an agreement stating their Star Trek ship designs were 'co-owned'; yeah, that would mean FASA could demand royalties if any of the co-owned designs were used, even if they themselves no longer have the right to publish and use those designs for something 'new' themselves.
(It's similar to the TAS/Filmation situation; but Filmation went 100% bankrupt/belly up; so at that point, the 'co-owned' property rights of everything Filmation worked on reverted back to Paramount/CBS - which was when TAS was suddenly made 'canon' again.)
Formerly known as Armsman from June 2008 to June 20, 2012
PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
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rattler2Member, Star Trek Online ModeratorPosts: 58,579Community Moderator
Not only that, I think some of the Fed designs from FASA are owned by someone else as well. Hence why we can't have TOS ships like the Federation class Dreadnought or Loknar class Frigate. They're owned by Franz Joseph, the original designer.
Comments
But canon as to hat exactly as STO isn't canon for any of the shows/films (unless a show or film mentions something from STO.)
Never played ST: Legacy, but hell, having a story relating to the V'Ger incident is hardly a new thing for any Star Trek game as hell, ST:TMP is 43 years old.
PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."
well in Legacy. V'Ger made the borg hence why the Borg Command ship ingame looks like the V'Ger ship
I prefer the race of living machines to remain a mystery. I don't go with the Borg origin thing, plus V'Ger was 300 years old or so, Borg been around for MUCH longer.
They never said that the living machines were Borg in Legacy. Voyager 6 was found and repaired by the living machines, but they couldn't understand the simple programming the probe had. I think you're thinking about the Shatner novels, which draw a much more defined connection between V'Ger, the living machines, and the Borg.
Its stated in Legacy that V'Ger created the Borg at first to assist in "learning all that is learnable" or whatever the line was. And when it couldn't find anything else like it, V'Ger decided that the galaxy was infested and the only purpose for humanoid life was assimilation. Also its implied that Voyager 6 fell into a black hole or something, and spat through time to the distant past.
Also STO can't use any material from Legacy anyways because Legacy was made by Bethesda. So its off limits, just like the Cardassian ship designs from Armada 2 because that game was made by Activision.
As Rattler pointed out STO cannot use anything substantial from Legacy, minor shout outs sure but nothing more then that so I wouldn't draw any conclusions beyond what's been literally shown on screen. This is what is part of STO story a) Borg have ships that look like V'ger and b) Lt. Illia, a character first introduced in Star Trek: The Motion Picture (released in 1979) is now part of the STO story. Anything beyond that is pure 100% speculation.
YET the Borg Command ship is V'Ger's ship instyle. and while bethseba made Legacy. Paramount and CBS own the rights so sto can as well
As far as V'ger and the race of living machines? I'm going to speculate that tying those to the Borg may be on the off limits list at least until the end of Picard season 3. The giant space tentacle monsters might be viewed as having something to do with the race of living machines. Moreso than the Borg.
No. They can't. Because that particular story in Legacy is owned by Bethesda for all intents and purposes. STO belongs to Cryptic, an entirely different company from Bethesda. The situation is exactly the same as getting ships from other games. Unless those original designs are in house, they can't be touched. So we can't get ships like:
Those designs are owned by the companies that made those games. Cryptic cannot legally touch those.
CBS owns the IP, yes. However the story of Star Trek Legacy is entirely a product of Bethesda, which was licensed to make that game.
There is no difinitive connection between V'Ger and the Borg. It is one of the fan theories that are out there. And yes while the Unimatrix ships are a direct nod to V'Ger, there is no actual, hard evidence that V'Ger is Borg. Its a nod to the fan theory regarding the origins of the Borg.
So can it happen? Sometimes, maybe, with a compelling enough reason. Will it happen? Almost certainly no.
The FASA designs are in an odd place legally since Paramount put a clause in the license that said they in effect jointly owned anything designed for Star Trek, which means the Winged Defender class (and the Wanderer class which actually appeared in live Trek as a wireframe) are theoretically fair game if CBS decides to allow it.
The problem is that the clause was very questionable at the time and Paramount decided to play it safe and never use anything from FASA in a way that could be challenged by FASA, (which is no longer an active game company but licenses its old game IP to active game companies instead), like using only the wireframe of the Wanderer (and possibly why it was upside-down on the screen) instead of a model.
All in all, it means that it is treated the same as the others anyway, so even those FASA ships are highly unlikely to make an appearance in STO (or even CBS Trek itself).
The joint ownership of any and all derivatives is pretty common, and would be in any Star Trek Licensing contract. Paramount can in theory use any ship that has appeared or been created under license. Just because that is almost always how those type contracts work. Plus they learned a few hard lessons when they ran into problems with 3rd party modelers during the TOS days. (Why Romulan's suddenly started buying and flying Klingon D-7's. There was a license issue with the Romulan BOP seen in Balance of Terror, and the builder wanted more money. They did eventually pay him off years later) Putting a derivatives clause into any and all licensing deals became pretty much pro forma by the mid to late 70's. In part because of skeevy dealings by Hollywood production companies. For example The Bionic Woman show was created explicitly to TRIBBLE the author/creator of the Six Million Dollar Man out of his TV royalties.
The Luna is an extra special case. The Luna did not just appear in books. Random House actually commissioned a full Studio Scale 5' filming miniature of the Titan. Which they took on tour to promote the books. I believe they gifted the model and the design rights back to Paramount as part of the marketing agreements. But they did realize a very tangible design of the Titan/Luna class. And it's the same design that appears here and in Lower Decks.
Besides, obviously the Terrans in STO have conquered the Borg and control them in weaponized mini collectives. What else could they possibly need Ilia for IF the game decides to link her to Borg.
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Also when Illia beamed back into ENT-nil she beamed in the nude though we only saw a blurry image from behind the privacy screen on the sonic shower before she got clothed and said screen opened, that said we saw enough to suggest that there was no major visible implants hidden by her clothes and she also have the same skin tone she had before capture. By contrast all Borg drones we have seen have highly visible implants (cybernetic ones that is) all over their body, not mention all active drones have had ashen grey skin (that or chalk white skin).
#LegalizeAwoo
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
FASA's Star Trek license was revoked by Paramount after their publishing of an unlicensed TNG manual for their Star Trek RPG at the time. FASA thought their license gave them the right to do it; but Paramount disagreed (it also used info from a way earlier version of the series Bible and other information FASA had not obtained directly from Paramount, so yeah, it wasn't 'canon accurate' but they released it BEFORE the first episode of TNG aired too).
Bottom line: FASA agreed to stop publication and distribution; but also as a result, when the Star Trek license came up for renewal, Paramount opted NOT to renew.
But yeah, the company still exists, but shifted focus opting to license out it's owned intellectual properties, in lieu of actually producing or marketing any products themselves; and if there was an agreement stating their Star Trek ship designs were 'co-owned'; yeah, that would mean FASA could demand royalties if any of the co-owned designs were used, even if they themselves no longer have the right to publish and use those designs for something 'new' themselves.
(It's similar to the TAS/Filmation situation; but Filmation went 100% bankrupt/belly up; so at that point, the 'co-owned' property rights of everything Filmation worked on reverted back to Paramount/CBS - which was when TAS was suddenly made 'canon' again.)
PWE ARC Drone says: "Your STO forum community as you have known it is ended...Display names are irrelevant...Any further sense of community is irrelevant...Resistance is futile...You will be assimilated..."