Canon

The Homeworld canon refers to the material which considered to have taken place within the fictional Homeworld universe. The Homeworld canon has been subject to intense fan debate over the years, as the series has expanded with new releases which have occasionally retconned or changed existing canon.

The Homeworld has also changed ownership several times over the years, being originally created by Relic Entertainment, purchased by THQ and is currently owned by Gearbox Software, which has led to different creative teams being involved with the franchise with different understandings of what is canon in the Homeworld universe.

Official materials

The officially-released Homeworld materials are as follows:

• The video games Homeworld, Homeworld: Cataclysm, Homeworld 2, Homeworld: Deserts of Kharak and Homeworld 3.
• The game manuals and other materials accompanying the main games, including Homeworld Historical and Technical Briefing, History of Hiigara: Prelude to the End Times, the Homeworld: Cataclysm Manual, the Deserts of Kharak Expedition Guide and the Homeworld 3 Historical and Technical Manual.
• The Revised Historical Briefings and Artwork book in the Homeworld Remastered Collector's Edition.
• Concept art for the games.
• A video released by the Spacedock YouTube channel with the support of Gearbox Software. The material in the video is specifically confirmed by Gearbox to be canonical.
• The spin-off games Homeworld Mobile and Homeworld: Vast Reaches appear to be broadly canonical, although some details clash with established information and the events of Homeworld 3.
• The tabletop roleplaying game Homeworld: Revelations was co-written by one of the key writers of Homeworld, Cataclysm and Homeworld 3 and provides details not seen elsewhere.

Definition of canon and official material

The officially-released material is not necessarily all canon. In particular, the game developers employed a number of retcons in later games in the series to more easily accommodate ideas and concepts not developed whilst working on the earlier games.

For example, in Homeworld it is stated that a standard hyperdrive is recovered from the wreck of the Khar-Toba, reverse engineered, copied and scaled up to serve as the Mothership's hyperdrive core. In Homeworld 2 it is claimed instead that the Khar-Toba carried one of the Three Great Hyperspace Cores to Kharak and this core was recovered intact from the wreckage and used to directly power the Mothership. In this case the latter explanation is generally accepted as canon, replacing the information from the original Homeworld.

Deserts of Kharak further retconned elements of the original games, revealing that additional alien spacecraft had crashed on Kharak over the years and that the Hyperspace Core had created a protective shield around the system to prevent an attack by the Taiidan. It also claimed that the expedition to find the Khar-Toba was a massive military expedition involving thousands of personnel across weeks or months, rather than a more modest scientific expedition as suggested in the original game. This information now supersedes information from the original game.

Cataclysm's canon status

Homeworld: Cataclysm, the second game in the series, was developed by Barking Dog Studios and released one year after the original game. Highly popular with fans and reviewers, the game's status in canon was called into question after Homeworld 2 failed to substantially mention it, and indeed appeared to contradict it in several respects.

• During the game, Kiith Somtaaw develops a number of highly advanced technologies, including energy weapons (and homing energy weapons) to replace close-range projectile weapons, more advanced armour and shield technology and of course the extremely powerful Siege Cannon weapon. None of these advances are present in Homeworld 2, despite the latter being set a century later.
• The Beast War is depicted as a large-scale interstellar conflict in which, at the very least, thousands of people are killed. It is not even mentioned in Homeworld 2 or its manual.
• Homeworld and, to some extent, Homeworld 2 both indicate that hyperspace is a transient effect caused by tunnelling through the space/time continuum to a different location. However, Homeworld: Catacylsm depicts it as an alternate dimension/universe in which life-forms dwell.

However, there are some indications in later material that Cataclysm indeed took place:

• Kiith Somtaaw are mentioned during Homeworld 2. Although they were not created for Cataclysm (they are mentioned in the original Homeworld manual), their prominent mention in Homeworld 2 over the numerous other kiith can be taken as a nod to the earlier game.
• The Bentusi in Homeworld 2 are depicted as having fled the galaxy or having been destroyed, leaving only the Great Harbor Ship of Bentus behind. No explanation for this is provided in Homeworld 2, as when last seen in Homeworld the Bentusi were a thriving, large race with numerous ships. However, Cataclysm depicts many of the Bentusi fleeing to another galaxy to escape the Beast. This would provide an explanation for the Bentusi's absence in Homeworld 2.
• Some of the technological innovations from Cataclysm are indeed present in Homeworld 2, such as the Resource Collector now serving a dual role as a repair ship instead of a completely different vessel having to be built.
• The Deserts of Kharak Explorer's Guide draws extensively on material in Cataclysm and its manual for the backstory of Kiith Somtaaw.

The only official statement by the current IP holders for a long time was that they do not consider Cataclysm to be "exactly" canon.

However, both promotional material for Homeworld 3 and information in Homeworld: Revelations confirmed that the events of Cataclysm are considered to be fully canon.