History Main / EveryBulletIsATracer

Has nothing to do with [[VideoGame/{{Overwatch}} Tracer.]]

* ''VideoGame/QuakeIIIArena'' zigzags with this trope. The standard-issue machine gun fires a stream of tracers, but most other slug-throwers don't, including the Scattergun. In fact, the lack of tracers is so prevalent that the game gives you the option of ringing a chime every time one of your shots lands on an opponent, just so you can tell whether you missed!

* ''VideoGame/CallOfDuty'' and its ''VideoGame/ModernWarfare'' spinoff are quite guilty of this trope. Not only are there frequent tracers, but some weapons like AA guns are seemingly loaded with nothing but them! Done differently in ''[[VideoGame/CallOfDutyModernWarfare2 Modern Warfare 2]]'', where the usual yellow-ish tracers remain, but it also adds ''more obvious red'' tracers when a gun with the FMJ attachment is fired.

* ''VideoGame/RedOrchestra'' averts this. Only the machine guns use tracers and they fire them only every 3 rounds or so, the same amount as the Germans and Russians used in UsefulNotes/WW2, though they are ColourCodedForYourConvenience.
** Explained by the Russians and Germans using different chemicals in the tracer rounds. Sulfur and magnesium if I remember correctly.
* Averted in the multiplayer of the new ''VideoGame/MedalOfHonor'' game. You pretty much can only tell where a bullet will go when it hits. This makes it fairly hard to pinpoint an enemy sniper, unless you see their muzzle flash.
* ''VideoGame/CommandAndConquerRenegade'' has ''color-coded'' tracers, for the basic auto rifle and chain gun, so you can tell whether the bullets flying around you can hurt you or not. Other ballistic weapons are either FrickinLaserBeams or weaponised GreenRocks, and so are slightly justified.

* ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid'': the last three rounds of the assault rifle's magazine are tracers every time. If you had the Infinite Ammo bandanna, it was sorta fun to slap it on for those three rounds, turning the gun into a [[FrickinLaserBeams frickin' laser]].

* Absolutely every weapon in ''Franchise/MassEffect''. The amunition consists of tiny particles of steel shot with such a high velocity that they turn the air they pass through into glowing plasma, making them look like energy weapons. Yet for the sake of visual effects, they appear to travel at slow enough speed to be clearly visible.

** Also during the UsefulNotes/VietnamWar, the AC-47 Spooky gunship earned the nickname "Puff the Magic Dragon" after the song by PeterPaulAndMary. This came about partly because a decent percentage of its loaded [[GatlingGood minigun]] rounds were tracers. Think about what tracers look like in the dark and you'll understand why it got the name.

* The ''VideoGame/TimeSplitters'' series plays this very straight; it's particularly notable in ''2'' because there's no variation in the paths of the bullets of most weapons. Empty a clip without moving the crosshair, and every single bullet will hit the same spot, so for a good few seconds you seem to be throwing out a solid tracer line. ''Future Perfect'' is much more realistic with regards to accuracy (or lack thereof), but this makes the trope that much more aesthetically satisfying, especially when you're letting loose with the Minigun or Plasma Autorifle. Ironically, it's most impressive to watch when you're the one being shot at...

* ''VideoGame/CallOfDuty'' and its ''VideoGame/ModernWarfare'' spinoff are quite guilty of this trope. Not only are there frequent tracers, but some weapons like AA guns are seemingly loaded with nothing but them! Done differently in ''Modern Warfare 2'', where the usual yellow-ish tracers remain, but it also adds ''more obvious red'' tracers when a gun with the FMJ attachment is fired.

* Tracers are near-omnipresent in ''VideoGame/TeamFortress2'': even shotguns fire tracers! The effect can be spammy, especially when you have a lot of Scouts or Heavies. Even nades and ''arrows'' are tracer-nades and tracer-arrows, but that effect is obviously non-diegetic.
** In the case of grenades and arrows, these two weapons can be deadly if you don't see them coming. Basically, it removes the unfairness of a demoman spamming grenades from an unknown location and almost-invisible arrows (they would be without the trail due to their speed). Also, the bullet tracers are a great way to let you know that running in front of an enemy [[MoreDakka Heavy]] can be painful.
*** How else could you be expected to [[RuleOfFun reflect arrows with a flamethrower]] if you couldn't see them?
** It would be easier to list which ranged weapons ''don't'' fire tracers, and that would be just the sniper rifle and variants.
*** One of the Sniper's new rifles, the Machina, explicitly says in its description that the shots are tracers. As a result, a shot will provide a nice, especially visible [[ColorCodedForYourConvenience team-colored]] line showing your general location to the enemy.

* ''Franchise/{{Halo}}'' is a guilty party too. In ''VideoGame/HaloCombatEvolved'', the [[MoreDakka Assault Rifle]] spits nothing but tracers. You can see every bullet. In fact many weapons in the series follow this trope. Some mounted some not.

* When Zorg demos the ZF-1's "replay button" feature for the Mangalores in ''Film/TheFifthElement'', not only is every bullet a tracer, but they ''[[BulletsDoNotWorkThatWay self-guide to the target even when he is pointing completely the other way]]''.

* Used in the Creator/UweBoll adaptation of ''Film/AloneInTheDark2005''. In the beginning no bullets are seen, save for a pointless bullet time sequence. But later on everybody gets super bright glowing tracers for every shot, and at the same time can take down enemies that were previously depicted as nearly invincible.
** A particularly egregious scene shows a CG tracer bullet fly CLEARLY over the intended target by a good three feet and the enemy still falls over dead.

* When Baby Doll is fighting the minigun-wielding robot in the first action scene in the movie ''Film/SuckerPunch'', the robot's minigun is seemingly loaded with pure tracers, most likely so the viewer can see what a terrible shot he is throughout the entire scene, as well as how clever Baby Doll is by dodging his shots.

** Truthfully, this movie is chock full of this trope.
*** Given the nature of the action sequences [[spoiler:they happen in Baby Doll's head as she's getting lobotomized]], this is pretty well justified.

* Also averted in ''SavingPrivateRyan'' while loading a machinegun:

* Dim Tracer rounds are a more sneaky variant of tracer rounds. They emit infrared light instead of visual light, thus being invisible to the human eye while still providing tracer effects to the stealthier guys with NightVisionGoggles. If you try to use normal tracer rounds in this situation, not only you blow your position sky high, you'll get, wait, are these normal tracer roun... My eyes, [[SensoryOverload MY EYES]]!!!

* ''VideoGame/QuakeIIIArena'' zigzags with this trope. The standard-issue machine gun fires a stream of tracers, but most other slug-throwers don't, including the Scattergun. The one notable exception is the Railgun, which leaves a distinctive double-helix smoke trail back to your firing position with every shot. The free browser-based remake, Quake Live, takes this UpToEleven by letting you customize the color of your smoke trails, just so everybody knows who fired that last shot. Given that the Railgun is a OneHitKill on an unarmored target, though, this may be more of a subtle taunt than a liability.

* Averted in ''VideoGameOperationFlashpoint''. Only machine guns typically fire tracers, and not every bullet is one. Rifle bullet tracers can be turned on or off in the difficulty options.

* Explicitly averted in ''TabletopGame/{{BattleTech}}'', where "tracer" ammunition for autocannons is its entire separate (optional) ammo ''type'' rather than the assumed default. Using it reduces nighttime penalties to hit, but also docks one point from the damage inflicted -- sufficiently large autocannons will barely notice, but for the AC/2 in particular this means cutting its already-unimressive standard damage clean in half.

* ''Series/BattlestarGalacticaClassic'' had lasers, but the [[Series/BattlestarGalacticaReimagined new one]] had kinetic kill weapons with red and blue tracers.

* Almost all weapons in ''{{Planetside}}'' have tracers colored based on their faction's primary color. Vanu Sovereignty tracers are blue (purple for their lasers), New Conglomerate tracers are yellow, and Terran Republic tracers are red. Some weapons like the anti-tank weaponry just have smoke trails, and the 10mm revolvers have a extremely fast moving bullet, so it's almost impossible to see.

* GlobalAgenda is often referred to as a "neon light porn show", in no small part due to this trope.

* ''Franchise/{{Halo}}'' is a guilty party too. In Halo 1, the [[MoreDakka Assault Rifle]] spits nothing but tracers. You can see every bullet. In fact many weapons in the series follow this trope. Some mounted some not.

* ''TheConduit'' is more realistic: while the alien and ultra-tech weapons are suitably glowy, the AKA47 firearms avoid the convenience of tracer fire all together.
** Played straight in ''{{Conduit 2}}'', however.

* Averted in ''OperationFlashpoint''. Only machine guns typically fire tracers, and not every bullet is one. Rifle bullet tracers can be turned on or off in the difficulty options.

* The PS1 game ''[[Franchise/DieHard Die Hard Trilogy]]'' presents a subversion - The second game available is a shoot-'em-up, and the only time the bullets act like tracers is when you collect a [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin "Tracer"]] power-up.
* ''RedOrchestra'' averts this. Only the machine guns use tracers and they fire them only every 3 rounds or so, the same amount as the Germans and Russians used in UsefulNotes/WW2, though they are ColourCodedForYourConvenience.

* Averted in the multiplayer of the new ''MedalOfHonor'' game. You pretty much can only tell where a bullet will go when it hits. This makes it fairly hard to pinpoint an enemy sniper, unless you see their muzzle flash.

* ''EndWar'' is ''very'' guilty of this. The brightly colored designs could easily be mistaken for [[FamilyFriendlyFirearms lasers]] if it weren't for the [[AllThereInTheManual background information]].

* The ''NavalOps'' series uses this, but it's really cool when firing 16-inch guns (and larger) or when your anti-aircraft batteries open up and fill the sky with flak.
* All ballistic weapons in ''MechWarrior Living Legends'' fire tracers only. .50 caliber machine guns, high explosive autocannons, and even artillery shells.

** Generally averted in the 3rd and 4th games, where only guns with very high ammo capacity (over 50 or so, meaning mostly limited to light machine guns like ''4'''s Mk. 46) fire one tracer every ten rounds.

* The [[VideoGame/{{Half-Life 2}} Source]] mod ''{{Insurgency}}'' has tracers every few rounds on the RPD and M249 machine guns.

* Funnily [[InvertedTrope inverted]] when [[http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2013/02/03/us/politics/03skeet_image2/03skeet_image2-articleLarge.jpg the photo]] of [[UsefulNotes/BarackObama President Obama]] shooting a two barrelled shotgun [[http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/guns/2013/feb/2/miller-obamas-browning-shotgun/ got published]], with comments like "fake", "Photoshop", "firing blank". Blank shotgun shells (or ordinary shells [[DontTryThisAtHome from which shot has been removed, but wad left inside]]) blow a big flame at the muzzle, unlike normal shells - if one doesn't see the flame, it wasn't a blank.

* Justified in [[http://neurologicalexcretions.blogspot.ca/2013/10/last-of-dragonriders.html this story]]. It features dragons that use a hydrogen-based flight system that seems to be shamelessly ripped off from ''Film/DragonsAFantasyMadeReal''. The results of them being shot up by machine guns fully loaded with burning phosphor-coated bullets are decidedly not pretty.

* Justified in [[http://neurologicalexcretions.blogspot.ca/2013/10/last-of-dragonriders.html this story]]. It features dragons that use a hydrogen-based flight system that seems to be shamelessly ripped off from ''DragonsAFantasyMadeReal''. The results of them being shot up by machine guns fully loaded with burning phosphor-coated bullets are decidedly not pretty.

-->'''Mellish''' One in five a tracer?
-->'''Henderson''' Yup, and tracers point ''both'' ways.

-->'''Henderson'' Yup, and tracers point ''both'' ways.

* Funnily [[InvertedTrope inverted]] when [[http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2013/02/03/us/politics/03skeet_image2/03skeet_image2-articleLarge.jpg the photo]] of [[BarackObama President Obama]] shooting a two barrelled shotgun [[http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/guns/2013/feb/2/miller-obamas-browning-shotgun/ got published]], with comments like "fake", "Photoshop", "firing blank". Blank shotgun shells (or ordinary shells [[DontTryThisAtHome from which shot has been removed, but wad left inside]]) blow a big flame at the muzzle, unlike normal shells - if one doesn't see the flame, it wasn't a blank.