Is Star Wars: The Old Republic Canon?
Star Wars: The Knights of the Old Republic is one of those less famous pieces of the ever-expanding Star Wars universe. It is one of the most beloved pieces of Star Wars media but is sadly left unexplored as of now. One of the questions most commonly asked about the game is whether it is considered canon today?
Knights of the Old Republic is officially not canon, however, some of the events from it gets referenced in the canon material. This is why most fans go by the rule that it is canon as long as new media doesn’t contradict it.
If you want to know more about this beloved piece of Star Wars lore and how it ties into the movies make sure to read this article all the way through.
Is Star Wars: Knights of the old Republic canon?
Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic is a series of video games developed by BioWare and published by LucasArts. The game centers around a storyline in which the player as a Jedi has to travel to different parts of the galaxy to defeat the forces dark lord Sith Malak has unleashed on the Galactic Republic.
The player makes different decisions that will alter the course of the player’s character in the story. As such players can explore both the Dark and the Light side of the Force.
Seeing that the Star Wars extended universe contains many different forms of media and a huge amount of media an often asked question is whether a certain piece of the media is canon to the original franchise.
Just like with many other similar pieces of media, the answer to this question is quite complicated. The games from the Star Wars franchise are generally not considered canon.
This is further complicated by the fact that George Lucas expressed his opinion that nothing beyond the movies, the original trilogy, the prequels, and the sequels are canon to his universe.
As of now, Lucasfilm was acquired by Disney a few years ago which means that the decision of what actually is canon lays with Disney. As such Disney is holding onto the rights for the expanded universe properties, no doubt in hopes of making new movies to fill the existing canon Star Wars timeline.
However, this is heavily contradicted, since different forms of media which are considered canon on a number of occasions reference events and people from the Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic.
In 2019. The Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker: The Visual Dictionary was released as a follow-up piece of media to the then-released third movie of the sequel trilogy.
The booklet features visual descriptions of certain star wars related media presented in the sequel trilogy. Among those is a page dedicated to the Sith Trooper legions. The book names a few notable ones among which is the third legion also known as the Revan legion. Revan is one of the more popular characters from the Knights of the Old Republic media.
Furthermore, Star Wars: The Clone Wars, which was one of the few pieces which remained canon in 2014 after the big removal of the content to create a blank slate for the upcoming content, reference the videogames on a number of occasions.
The Clone Wars mention prominent locations from the videogame such as Moraband and the Sith planet formerly known as Korriban. The series also references Darth Bane, a character who was an apprentice to the formerly mentioned, Darth Revan.
Since this, quite a complicated solution and it takes a lot of time and energy to keep up with Disney’s constant inclusions and exclusions the rule of thumb for this particular videogame series is that as long as there is no contradicting content it could be considered canon. In a sense, you could say it is canon until proven otherwise.
When does Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic take place?
This is another complicated question; however, we do get some explanations in the Revan tie-in novel. The main plot takes place in 3 956 Before the Battle of Yavin, the final battle of Episode IV.
This Battle takes place around 303 years before The Treaty of Coruscant, the act that brought the end to the Great Galactic War in 3653 before the Battle of Yavin. This means that the Knights of the Old Republic takes place 300 years before The Old Republic.
This would put the series on the timeline around 4 000 years before the Galactic Empire was founded, during the time when the Galactic Republic was attacked by the armada led by a new and powerful Sith Lord, Darth Malak.
However, there are certain cinematic scenes during the game which take place during a different time. For example, the opening scene of the game is shown in a way that indicates it takes time in the past, relative to the timeline of the game.
Some of these scenes are the ones that show a Jedi apprentice called Satele Shan, who gets away, but in the main storyline he is no longer an irrelevant Jedi apprentice but one of the most important leaders of the Jedi Order.
The exact time of the scene is not specified, however, it would be safe to assume that it takes place sometime around 20 years after the Treaty of the Coruscant.
Is Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic connected to the movies?
Star Wars franchise with all its canonical and non-canonical material is huge and as such most fans have trouble determining when and where in relation to the film series certain pieces of media take place. One such part of the franchise is the Old Republic It is a mysterious part of Star Wars lore that thus far was not further explored in the more mainstream forms of media.
The Old Republic as such takes place a long time before the original trilogy which is why most fans aren’t familiar with it. A lot of events taking place between the Old Republic time and the events of the movies get referenced often in the movie series.
As for some direct overlap it doesn’t really happen since the story of Star Wars: The Knights of Old Republic takes place so much earlier than the story depicted in the movies.
The Galactic Republic, which is often referred to as the Old Republic, was a form of organization between thousands of star systems established sometime around 25 000 years before the Battle of Yavin.
After the rise of the new and Strong Sith forces accompanied by a cult of Mandalorians, the conflict with the Jedi got even more heated. The warfare eventually grew and took a toll on the structure and organization of the Republic, which eventually caused it to crumble to a shadow of its former self.
The Old Republic managed to gain some leverage back after the forces of the Republic managed to take back the capital and the number of Sith went down in proportion to how many there were just a few years ago.
Despite this turnaround, the Republic’s state continued to decay and the state would only be restored after the peace was concluded and the Republic was restored as the Modern Republic mainly characterized by the staggering rise in democracy.
After the High Republic was instated it continued to thrive with minor setbacks. This is when the events of the prequel trilogy take place since one of the defining times of the High Republic was the invasion of Naboo, an event that starts as with the prequels.
This still leaves sometime between the events of the prequels and the events of the Knights of the Old Republic. However, we can say that the story of the Knights of the Old Republic is connected with the movies since it deals with different changes within the Republic which eventually led to the state we came to know in the prequel trilogy.
