If you chewed through the previous article you may notice that I talked only Federation Dawn and not much about Evolution. That's because Evolution is a huge project and it would take forever to finish it and release it in one go. It probably wouldn't be wise either as some of the features need a lot of polishing, something I probably can't do alone without the feedback of the gaming community. Therefor Evolution will be released in multiple chapters each allowing you to play a longer part of the timeline. Federation Dawn, being the first of these chapters allows you to play from 2150 to 2245.
Star Trek is in an unfortunate(?) situation compared to Star Wars because it doesn't have explicit sources a hard canon (other than the series and movies of course) and therefor there are various sources you can take inspiration from.
The Evolution timeline starts in 2150, about where the series Enterprise begun. There is no Federation yet and the United Earth makes its first steps in the galaxy. I don't even talk about this era much, you've all seen it in TV.
During the Earth-Romulan War (2156-2160) Evolution merges Enterprise with Masao Okazaki's excellent Starfleet Museum timeline. That seemingly leads to some controversy but I'll deal with those in another article. This also means that I completely skip Discovery. Sorry guys, but I just don't like that show. At all.
I also tried to incorporate as many of the FASA and Federation & Empire material into the game as possible - regarding the technology and the conflicts at least. So according to Evolution in the early 23rd century the tension in the Alpha Quadrant rises, especially as the Klingons get deeply involved in a four-ways conflict with the Hydrans, Lyrans and Kzinthi. The shifting balance of power eventually drags the Federation, the Gorn, the Romulans and the Tholians into the conflict which by the 2230s turns into a quadrant-wide war called the General War - the World War I of the future. And that's where Federation Dawn ends.
The General War rage son for almost two decades. According the Evolution canon one of the many skirmishes was the Battle of Axanar. So yeah, that Axanar is considered canon by Evolution to a certain degree.
The General War ends in 2248. Note that the Original Series starts in 2263! In the mean time Klingons and the Fedration make what they were best at that time, continue the hostilities along their common border, while the Romulans waited in isolation for the perfect opportunity - or whatever they were waiting for then, Romulan plans are never clear for a mere mortal. Despite being a relatively peaceful era for the main powers, some major power shifting was going on in the background.
The Kzinthis are integrated into the Federation while the Hydrans and the Lyrans collapse to make way to a new empire, the Cardassian Union.
From there the story is pretty much well-known. Four Years War, Kithomer Accords, Tomed Incident, Cardassian War, Dominion War, and finally the Battle of Bassen Rift and the death of the Romulan Senate. I'm sure I don't have to go into details for you Trekkies ;)
Anyway after 2380 Evoluiton deviates from both the Star Trek books and the now considered canon story of Star Trek Online, following its own path into the future. But I'm not gonna tell you about that until much later.
Stay tuned for Federation Dawn!
