Hypothetical time!
What would the Matoran Universe as we know it be like if Greg had not taken to answering FAQ outside of just writing the story? We all know about the AskGreg Format, but what if those Contests & Questions were gone?
I’d like to start a discussion, this one, where we can share what would and wouldn’t be “canon”.
I’ll start with an example, one we all know very well: Greg never would’ve said “Love is not Canon”
Got the idea? Get discussing!
Granted, that isn’t 100% Greg’s fault. That one might’ve come up regardless, especially with the Inika, since we’d likely have Hahli and Jaller…just drop all or most hints.
We’d lose Tuyet and the Toa Empire…which I’m admittedly ok with. I want to say we might have much less Rahkshi powers, that’d be nice, But I don’t remember if all 42 were him.
I’m assuming that Greg is still the main writer, just not able to answer fan questions, so not much would be different. Whether love is canon would be uncertain as Greg still wouldn’t have featured romance in his stories.
Let’s see what else:
Let me know if I missed anything.
chaos.
It would be amazing, utopia, flawless
g2 would still be going strong
We wouldn’t be having Canon Contests.
Velika wouldn’t have even really been anything, wouldn’t he? I feel like everything past his weird dialogue was AskGregs and community contests
I wonder what Orde would be? 
As much as she didn’t do, makes me sad
I think it necessary to say if Greg never made these I wouldn’t be a Bionicle fan. Literally my reintroduction right there 
Yeah, 2,008 is probably my favorite or 2nd favorite year, story-wise. 
(Alternate universes “make Freddy so happy”, to reference a Big Hero 6 quote. I really enjoy extra lore and nerdy minutia, to the point that if I was to craft any franchises, I’d maybe have to take care that I didn’t 1) get so hung up on what character such-and-such’s favorite scarf is to the point that it caused neglect/detriment to the actual plot/character development of the overall story, or 2) Give the alternate timelines and character variants too much public exposure (because “when everything’s multiverse/extended universe/special minutia, nothing is”, to reference an Incredibles quote).)
Would Krakua not exist? Or would that contest have gone on the same without Greg being involved in Bionicle?
Also, we would not have gotten Time Trap;— if it comes down to either that book existing or not making Hahli/Jaller and Macku/Hewkii stay single, I’ll take the best of the books, thanks.
We wouldn’t have much to have contests about, since they’re mostly for Greg’s original creations.
R.I.P. bendy… again.
I think the elements of the entire “Yesterday Quest” team would be different, if I am remembering correctly.
We would just have a lot more unanswered questions and gaps in our knowledge about the G1 world. I think a lot of people don’t quite appreciate just how much Greg has given; although certainly I don’t think he’d have been able to had he not kept working for Lego all this time.
Agreed - people often forget that without Greg, we’d have gotten:
Of course, the topic question is asking about his FAQ stuff, as opposed to a truly “Gregless” MU. But I think that a Gregless MU of any kind is actually not something we should be wishing for.
A gregless MU is a noexistant MU
Bruh, have you even read the first chronicles? The full version of it is better than anything that Greg has ever written. Only thanks to Hapka we have these well written characters, whose personalities were reduced in the later Greg’s novels.
Yeah right, the first story arcs got the novels, but the later wouldn’t have for some reason. The same Hapka could have easily be hired for that.
Hapka’s books weren’t released until '03, as a sort of patch-up job for the video game that was supposed to tell the Toa’s story, but got canned (and you can see how the story of that would of looked - the Toa had a big dance after every victory…)
But while '01 was actually being written, the original plan was to have the Toa be all mystical and samey. The whole vibe of them getting there and forgetting their identities wasn’t really the gist of it - it was more “Yes, I am the mighty Tahu, and I bring the Fire, and I will save the island.” Greg was the one who persuaded Bob Thompson to change that into the six, distinct personalities we ended up getting - even if those personalities did eventually get fleshed out in Hapka’s book.
Again, Greg actually wasn’t hired - it was done in his spare time. There’s no guarantee that Lego was willing to pay an external writer if they didn’t have their own guy doing it practically for free - once '01 had it’s story “filled in”, they may well have ditched the novels entirely.
In fact, the novels were an explicit response to the community’s confusion surrounding what exactly happened in the plot during G1 - so without Greg’s community involvement on BZPower, the “story team” may well have never decided to write the novels. They were centered around sets that had already gone out of retail, after all.
That’s an interesting possibility to consider - perhaps without Greg’s involvement in answering questions, the books never would have even come about at all. Not necessarily the case, but quite a feasible outcome.
Yes, including the draft version that got translated from another language.
Personally, I prefer Greg’s style, but the point I was trying to make is that regardless of who did it better (which is a subjective debate) Greg was the one who had the idea to give the Toa distinct personalities.
It wasn’t like that at all. Toa having lost their memories and not knowing their purpose on the island was in the story from the the first story bibles. The different personalities too, they even planned to give Toa ages to act based on. The only thing that changed is that Toa became more casual in their relationships instead of acting all mighty.
Bob Thompson was planning seven story arcs, that would be fleshed out in some sort of media, from the beginning. The only thing we can thank for it being novels is the game’s cancelation. So we got Hapka’s books and would continue to get them from him or smb else. The only role forums played is showing the team that there was a demand for a solid told story. Bionicle team was hiring writers and directors from the very first years, so it wasn’t an issue of lego finances either.
Same here. For whatever reason, when I got the first few Chronicles books, I might’ve felt (no offense to Hapka, she did a good job) kind of like I had to get through the first three books to get to what Greg wrote.
Now, my personal experience with Greg’s books being more enjoyable to me personally could possibly be because Hapka’s books were only meant to cover '01 and part of '02, and the story became more expanded and plot-intensive and all of that in later days, but the way I look at it, Time Trap was a book where Greg was given a lot of creative freedom, and it shined so brightly with flying colors, I felt like a kid in a candy store reading it.