The "Star Trek Chronology" has laid down certain time frames for the USS Enterprise's five-year mission under Captain James T. Kirk.
2264-2265
2265-2266
2266-2267
2267-2268
2268-2269
First year of USS Enterprise's five-year mission.
Second year.
Third year. (TOS Season 1)
Fourth year. (TOS Season 2)
Fifth year. (TOS Season 3)
In 25A, the computer entry for "USS Enterprise" states that the starship was on the fourth year of its five-year mission of exploration. The "Star Trek Chronology" gives the time frame 2267-2268 as the fourth year of Kirk's mission. In JR, the computer entry for "USS Enterprise" remained the same, still stating that the starship was on the fourth year of its five-year mission. This therefore suggests that JR also occurs within the 2267-2268 duration. Hence, it would have been consistent to consider 25A as occurring in 2267, and JR occurring in 2268.
However, the ending for JR seems to indicate that Kirk's five-year mission ended shortly thereafter, which can only mean that JR (or at least the end of JR) has to occur in 2269, since the "ST Chronology" gives the time frame 2268-2269 as the fifth year of Kirk's mission.
Another factor to take into consideration for determining the dates of the games is how recent are the information provided by the USS Enterprise's computer in both games. To understand what I am talking about, you should realise that, if the games had indeed both occurred in the fourth year of the five-year mission (only during TOS Season 2), then obviously information from the fifth year (TOS Season 3) should not be avaliable since they have not happened yet! The issue of how recent the computer entries are gets a little more complicated when the computer entries in 25A (disk and CD-ROM versions), JR (disk version), and JR (CD-ROM version) are slightly different from each other! Below is a thorough analysis:
- As a useful reference, here is a short chronological sequence of the last few episodes of TOS Season 3:
2269
"Whom Gods Destroy"
"The Mark of Gideon" (last episode of 2268)
"The Light of Zetars" (first episode of 2269)
"The Cloud Minders"
"The Way to Eden"
"Requiem for Methuselah"
"The Savage Curtain"
"All Our Yesterdays"
"Turnabout Intruder" (last episode of 2269)
The entry for "Zetars" says that the energy beings called Zetars destroyed the Federation archive at Memory Alpha, an event which occurred in "The Lights of Zetars". Therefore, it is logical to assume 25A occurs after "The Lights of Zetars".
"Zetars : ...The Zetars were responsible for the destruction of the Federation complex at Memory Alpha."
In "The Savage Curtain", the crew of the USS Enterprise makes contact with the natives of the planet "Excalbia". This is corroborated by the computer entry for "Excalbia", which reads:
"Excalbia : ...The level of this field was quantified as Factor 7 Artificial Power, which was deemed too much for an uninhabited planet. This fact led to the discovery of the native life on the planet."
The presence of this statement describing the discovery of the Excalbians on the planet indicates that "The Savage Curtain" had already occurred before the start of the game 25A.
The entries "Sarpeidon", "Atavachron" and "Atoz, Mr." refer to the episode "All Our Yesterdays". The entries for "Atavachron" and "Atoz, Mr." do not explicitly state that the events in that particular episode had already occurred.
"Atavachron : A Sarpeidian device which held a disc of a certain historical and attuned the physiological and brain structure of the user to allow a person to adjust to that era. It also provided the possibility of return to the present." This is how the entry was written in 25A. The additional line in my Encyclopedia saying that the atavachron was destroyed in the explosion of its star system comes from ST:SA.
"Atoz, Mr. : The librarian on Sarpeidon" This is how the entry was written in 25A. The additional information in my Encyclopedia comes from the "ST Encyclopedia".
More interesting is the entry for "Sarpeidon".
"Sarpeidon : The only satellite of the star Beta Niobe, an impending nova. The natives possessed a high degree of technology which included the atavachron, which could send people back into the history of the planet."
The entry states that the star Beta Niobe was still an impending nova (that means it still have not exploded yet) during the 25A, while it is known (although I haven't seen that episode) that Beta Niobe had exploded by the end of "All Our Yesterdays". This therefore means that "All Our Yesterdays" has not occurred yet before 25A, although it is possible that the computer of the USS Enterprise simply has not updated its database yet.
The entry "Camus II" refer to the very last episode of TOS, "Turnabout Intruder".
"Camus II : An uninhabited planet containing the ruins of a long-dead civilization. It was explored by a group of Federation scientists led by Janice Lester."
Again, this entry does not explicitly state that the events of "Turnabout Intruder" have already occurred, although again it is possible that the Enterprise's computer has not yet updated itself to include the events of "Turnabout Intruder". So, it can be assumed that "Turnabout Intruder" has yet to occur by the time of 25A.
The above arguments give good reasons to assume that 25A has to occur sometime after "The Savage Curtain", which itself occur in 2269,
and possibly (but not necessarily) before "All Our Yesterdays" and "Turnabout Intruder". This therefore means that both 25A and JR have to occur in 2269 (after "The Savage Curtain"), since 2269 was the last year of Kirk's five-year mission. (Recall that the ending for JR seems to indicate that Kirk's five-year mission ended shortly thereafter, and therefore JR should occur in 2269.) Unfortunately, this idea is immediately contradicted by several elements within the two games.
In "Vengeance" (25A), Kirk says that Dr. Breddell was dismissed from the Vardaine Science Council ten years ago. Subsequently, in "Federation" (JR), Kirk says that Dr. Breddell was dismissed from the Vardaine Science Council eleven years ago, indicating that there is a year difference between 25A and JR. Hence, it is not possible for both 25A and JR to occur in 2269. Therefore, for simplicity, I assume that 25A occurred in 2268, and JR occurred in 2269. The above two statements will continue to remain consistent, as well as the idea that Kirk's mission ended shortly after JR. However, there continues to be at least two contradictions:
(1) The USS Enterprise computer continues to state that the starship is on the fourth year of its five-year mission in BOTH games. (This might still be right for 25A [set in 2268], since the fourth year of the mission occurs during 2267-2268, but it is no longer right for JR [set in 2269])
(2) The continued presence of yet-to-have-occurred events in the form of computer entries, in particular for 25A.
I am going to assume that the Enterprise computer just have not updated itself yet to say that it is on its fifth year of its mission for (1), although I am unable to come up with any satisfactory reason to explain (2), and I will leave it as that!
"Coleman, Arthur : Federation scientist, repeated reprimanded for incompetence, who joined with Dr. Janice Lester in an attempt to kill Captain James T. Kirk of the USS Enterprise."
"Lester, Janice : Federation archaeologist, whose attempt to abduct the body of USS Enterprise Captain James T. Kirk was thwarted, stardate 5928.5. Dr. Lester is currently being treated in a Federation psychiatric facility."
Evidently, according to the above two entries, the events of "Turnabout Intruder" must have already occurred before the start of JR, and therefore JR must occur in 2269, since the entire run of TOS has already happened! This actually concurs with my above arguments with respect to 25A!
Curiously, in the CD-ROM version of JR, most of the computer entries referring to TOS episodes have been removed, while some new entries whose apparent purpose is to introduce the Star Trek universe to the absolute layman were added (entries like "Sciences Station", "Anti-matter", Bridge", etc.). Also, entries pertaining only to 25A (such as star systems on the 25A starmap), as well as non-appearing characters and elements (eg. Virchan, Antonia Gruen, USS Billy Bishop, etc.) have been removed. Certain remaining entries were edited, and in most cases a few lines from each entries were removed. There is now a lesser number of 230 computer entries in JR (CD-ROM version).
As a result of the removal of computer entries, the most recent entry ends up to be "Excalbia", the planet encountered in "The Savage Curtain". The entry, although slightly edited, is more or less similar to the "Excalbia" entry previously mentioned in my arguments for 25A. The entries of "Sarpeidon", "Atavachron", "Atoz, Mr.", and "Camus II" were removed, giving the impression that the episodes they appeared in ("All Our Yesterdays" and "Turnabout Intruder") have not happened yet, although their original text would indicate so anyway.
Therefore, from the computer entries of JR (CD-ROM version), one can tell that JR takes place after "The Savage Curtain" (set in 2269), but not necessarily before "All Our Yesterdays" and "Turnabout Intruder". In any case, these arguments reaffirms my conjecture that 25A occurs in 2268, and JR occurs in 2269.