Micro-continuity
Since the dawn of the Transformers brand a variety of unconnected media has conspired to create multiple continuities, even within individual franchises. The most famous such continuity-split is the divergence of the original cartoon and comic, which contributed sometimes similar, but ultimately irreconcilable versions of Generation 1. While the most prominent continuities are well known, there exist many "micro-continuities": continuities about which only very limited information is available, yet which manage in that small space to be incompatible with the major continuities.
Although all officially-produced fiction is canon for some continuity or another, the significance of these "micro-continuities" is a matter of individual fans' tastes and personal canons.
Limited fictions
Continuities that exist in a very small number of works that may share an apparent single continuity, such as the Ladybird or Find Your Fate books. Some continuities may even appear in only a single isolated work, such as the Transformers Beast Wars: Transmetals video game.
Although usually small and insignificant in the wider scheme of things, such tales can contain interesting or unique takes on certain characters or situations, for example providing actual stories in which Ultra Magnus and Galvatron spent a prolonged period as opposing leaders, a status quo hinted at by much of the lead-in and post-movie product advertising but which was ultimately never realised in the major fictions.
Prose stories
Probably the most underdeveloped medium in Transformers fiction, prose stories are generally considered to be offshoots from the of their parent continuities, as is often the case with the "expanded universe"s of even quite prolifically novellised franchises, like Star Trek. However, the prose stories that were included in Marvel UK annuals are a notable exception to this, as they are almost universally treated as part of UK continuity.
Vintage Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books are, by there very nature, micro-continuities (or, if you want to be really pedantic about it, contain multiple nano-continuties within them) since their various alternate outcomes frequently involve the deaths of major characters.
A small, short-lived boom in original Transformers prose fiction was inspired by the success of Dreamwave's comics. The Keepers Trilogy was clearly intended to be set in the Dreamwave continuity, but as the novels were not published by (or with much real involvement of) Dreamwave Productions and subsequent Dreamwave comics made no explicit reference to the events portrayed therein, it is a matter of personal canon whether the trilogy should be considered part of the DreamwaveVerse proper, or as a micro-continuity offshoot.
A more cut-and-dried case exists in the prose anthology book Transformers Legends. The forward by editor David Cian explicitly states that the enclosed short stories should not be considered to have canonical status in their respective continuities and should be regarded merely as "what-if?" tales. In the cases of some such entries such as "Paddles", "Fire in the Dark", and "Lonesome Diesel", it is quite clear from their lack of adherence to recognisable pre-existing continuities that they should certainly be considered micro-continuties, if anything.
Other tales, however, such as "Singularity Abyss", "Parts", "A Meeting of Minds" and "Redemption Centre" actually fit quite nicely into their respective continuities and, were it not for the statement in the forward, could be easily deemed canon. It is thus debatable as to whether these stories should be considered mere micro-continuity offshoots as well, something more, or something less.
Implied continuities
While never truly represented by any narrative fiction, some micro-continuities arise as the result of discrepancies between the toylines and characters portrayles elsewhere. In Generation 1 this was often limited to individual characters' appearances varrying drastically between toy and cartoon (and, by extension, most other media). Prominent examples of this are Jetfire and Ironhide.
Implied continuities can also include discrepancies in tech specs bios such as Galvatron being described as merely "Decepticon City Commander" and possessing a lower rank than his unspecified superiors (not to mention his being the reformatted Megatron is not even alluded to, likely to avoid spoiling the movie). A more striking example of such differences implying whole continuities into existence occurs in Beast Wars and Beast Machines (see below.)
Bio-only continuities
Some toys exist in a complete continuity vacuum, the only indications as to the nature of the universe they inhabit that can be gleaned are from their short bios/tech specs.
Promotional toys
Japanese exclusives are particularly prone to this, especially some of their more bizarre cross-promotion toys in recent years such as Pepsi Convoy, or the Takara Sport Label Optimus Prime and Megatron figures who transform into miniature Nike sneakers, or Takara Music Label's iPodimus Prime or MP3 player Soundwave. Is one to seriously consider these characters can fit into a mainstream version of G1 continuity as their bios imply, or does one relegate them to wierd little micro-continuities in which Optimus has an insatiable desire for signing endorsement deals? YOU decide.
Machine Wars
The Machine Wars toyline is the best example of bio-only Implied Continuity as, fairly uniquely, it represents an entire line (albeit a very small one) which posseses no official fiction in any form save for the toy bios, in which story hints are limited mainly to the existance of Megaplex and a few peculiarities about Thundercracker. Given the lack of any other story material, whether the differences/character development with Thundercracker imply a whole new micro-continuity or are viewed as new developments within an existing continuity falls soley down to personal preference.
Beast Toylines vs. Shows
Unlike G1, the Beast Era has not featured major divergent continuities, leading (at least for most of its existance) to a fairly unified canon.
However, due to the high cost and time constraints of a fully-CG animated series both Mainframe Beast shows were limited in the number of characters that could be included. They are fairly unique amongst the Transformers franchises in not featuring an encyclopedic inclusion of nearly every availiable toy as a character in the show. As a result, the main Beast Wars and Beast Machines fiction-depicted continuities feature only a limited proportion of the overall number of toys/characters created, and furthermore the tight storytelling and premises of the shows leave little room for their inclusion in an "off camera" capacity (although see below: "When is a micro-continuity not a micro-continuity?"). An additional problem in Beast Wars is that several characters such as Waspinator and Rhinox were featured as Transmetal toys while in the cartoon they did not recieve these upgrades, thus creating further discrepancy.
One can either presuppose that the toyline itself implies a micro-continuity in which the full number of toy characters coexisted, or one could attempt to reconcile these characters with an already existant micro-continuity: that of the pre-cartoon series techspecs and minicomic...
The "G1 Beast Wars"
Tech Specs for the first waves of Beast Wars indicated that the Beast Wars took place on modern-day, human-inhabited, industrialized Earth, and that Optimus Primal and Megatron were just G1 Optimus Prime and Megatron in the latest in their long series of reformatted bodies. This storyline was shocased in one installment of "Limited Fiction," a comic which was included with the Bat Optimus and Alligator Megatron 2-pack.
Although later Tech Specs were changed to reflect the universe established by the Beast Wars cartoon, these first-series materials create a micro-continuity that features a bat-mode Optimus Prime(al) leading troops that include the likes of both Rattrap and Armordillo against an alligator-mode Megatron and his minions such as Tarantulas and Iguanus, stalking their secret genetic labs, and duking it out for the fate of modern, urban Earth. Whether one presumes that Optimus and Megatron subsequently "upgraded" to their gorilla and T-Rex modes (the comic certainly implies that Megatron plans to), or if one chooses to then include later waves of show, non-show, and even Transmetal characters is open to debate.
Crawling with Maximals
By the same token, the Beast Machines toyline contained many toy-only characters, both Maximal, Vehicon, and "other" who were again fairly incompatable with the tighly-plotted continuity of the cartoon that presents the dominant canon. A similar "implied continuity" can be posulated that would include these extra characters in an alternate version of events that supported a larger cast.
When is a micro-continuity not a micro-continuity?
There are some continuities which have attempted to retroactively explain the presence (or rather absence) of the non-show characters in both Beast Wars and Beast Machines. 3H's Wreckers comics and associated projects attempted to fill out much of the Beast Machines gaps in an arguably workable fashion, while more recently IDW has tackled virtually every toy-only Beast Wars character in Beast Wars: The Gathering. However, these two storylines contradict each other, and neither have (as yet) provided expansive storylines. Whether one deems these stories to be part of the larger show-based canon (despite contradictions), individual "complimentary" continuities, or indeed just largeish micro-continuities themselves is, like most things, up to the individual fan's taste and personal canon.
By the same token, the comic-book fictions for Generation 2 and Transformers Classics present divergent timelines from the U.S./U.K. Marvel comic, each representing full toylines. Compare to Machine Wars which is apparently a continuation of G1 but may or may not exist (later) in the same timeline as G2. Again, whether examples such as these of divergent offshoots of larger continuities should be classed as micro-continuities (in spite of toylines and many issues of fiction) or be included with their "parent" continuities as branched extensions is, again, a matter of taste and personal canon.
