I don't really have enough experience with changes in systems to offer a huge amount here. The only one I can really discuss is D&D from 3.x to 4.0. I guess, here, I've seen both types of change: that between 3.0 and 3.5 was (from a player's point of view, at least) comparatively minor. We did a pretty seamless in-flight transition in Phatil. Whereas 3.x to 4.0 was vast. I suspect a lot of it is just because 3.x was my first encounter with D&D but the rule changes for 4.0 made it "not real D&D" to me. But then, the 7th Doctor is always the Doctor to me, because he was the one I grew up with. TNG is always what Star Trek means to me for much the same reason.
I enjoyed playing Drake's Seven and I'd be happy to play more 4E D&D, but in my head, it's in a very different compartment to 3E -- it's basically a different game to me.
Whereas 3.x to 4.0 was vast. I suspect a lot of it is just because 3.x was my first encounter with D&D but the rule changes for 4.0 made it "not real D&D" to me. But then, the 7th Doctor is always the Doctor to me, because he was the one I grew up with. TNG is always what Star Trek means to me for much the same reason.I think the "my first encounter shapes my opinion" thing is definitely a factor. As you say, our view on Doctor Who, Star Trek and other things is coloured by the version we first encountered - even though we know there exist people who have watched Doctor Who and Star Trek since they were brand new 60s shows, we can't help but parse things differently. Tom Baker has always been an "ex-Doctor" to us; Darth Vader has always been Luke's father; the original Trek series has always been set in the 2260s
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On the topic of the 3E to 4E change: I mentioned above that part of the problem with edition changes is that the closer your edition is to the core, the less conversion issues you have but the less you can address major problems. An example "in the wild" of this is Pathfinder, which had an open beta and had some people very excited that it would fix all their problems with 3.X, but it ended up being more minor changes and couldn't do much to fix Linear Fighters Quadratic Wizards or the like - no doubt because doing so would break compatibility with all the previous Paizo D20 products, which would be a bad business decision. The end result, though, is a "new edition" which is only of value to people who thought the old edition was mostly fine
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I enjoyed playing Drake's Seven and I'd be happy to play more 4E D&D, but in my head, it's in a very different compartment to 3E -- it's basically a different game to me.
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