History Main / InWorkingOrder

** Averted with covenant weapons: While humans can use them, they don't figure out how to reload them until the second game.

** Averted with covenant weapons: While humans can use them, they don't figure out how to reload them until Halo2.

* ''{{Warhammer40000}}'': Da Orkz are the master of this trope. They can pretty much use anything made by other species. An example of this would be the Looted Leman Russ Tank, originally belonging to the Imperial Guard. {{Subverted}}, though: it's not that da orkz understand how to operate it, [[ClapYourHandsIfYouBelieve they work because da orkz simply believe that they work]].

** Although that could be because the Doctor's old enough to know how to work most forms of technology, and it was made by [[HumanAliens relatively human-like aliens]]. Just guessing, though.

* A common argument in StarWars vs. StarTrek debates is that X side (often the Federation) will be able to capture and reverse-engineer enemy technology to turn it against them. This logic often falls very flat when you consider that the technologies are often based on completely different understandings of science and VERY different levels of technology (not to mention the language/alphabet barrier between the universes hampering even reading the instruction manual).

* Subverted in ''CowboysAndAliens''. Zeke finds what appears to be an alien sidearm, and uses it to destroy a random alien object as a test. Turns out the sidearm is actually a welding tool, and the random object is an alien grenade. Its alternate modes of fire are also amusing.

* In the ''{{X-Com}}'' series, it is in your best interest to quickly research alien items, and THEN this is in full effect. You can manufacture them after that, but why should you if you can just take them from the hands of dead aliens? Even so, some items like armor can only be used to research human-usable equivalents, and it's taken a tad far in some cases. For example, every alien enemy fought in-game that can carry weapons and grenades is at least [[HumanoidAliens vaguely humanoid]], and certainly has an opposable thumb fairly similar to ours ([[JustifiedTrope and it works pretty well, so why should we be the only ones to evolve it?]]). The fluff is even explicit about the fact that most of them are genetically engineered and/or selectively bred to be [[DumbMuscle more obedient than smart]], so AK47 levels of simplicity to operate would be a necessity. Your troops still can't pick one up from a dead alien grunt and use it until they've been researched.
** At least one fanfic HandWaves this by claiming alien weapons were DNA-locked to their owners. What the scientists were doing was to add humans to the list of permitted users (and while they were at it, they also added iron sights), and the questionably-canon "Data Cannisters" suggest that the alien grenade had some weird psionically-activated arming system that nobody could figure out and which had to be stripped out and replaced with a mechanical timer.

** Another example of this is [[spoiler:the lost planet Ilos. Even after thousands of years with nobody there, everything from elevators to VI computers are still working. Of course, the VI is very degraded, and it supposedly shut down nonessential systems and life support to keep things going, but did you seen [[RagnarokProofing how much moss was on its interface panel]]?]]

* In the show ''{{Aquila}}'' two school kids find a small alien ship, with a dead Roman Centurion in it, it's perfectly tuned for humans but the downside is that its controls are in Latin, later they figure out that you can change the language to English thus making it a lot easier to control. So it?8364;™s an alien vessel, tuned for humans, been underground for at least 2000 years plus however long it was before the Centurion found it and it can be configured for modern languages, neat.
* In the ''{{X-Com}}'' series, it is in your best interest to quickly research alien items, and THEN this is in full effect. You can manufacture them after that, but why should you if you can just take them from the hands of dead aliens? Even so, some items like armor can only be used to research human-usable equivalents, and it's taken a tad far in some cases (fancy alien sword, not a LaserSword or anything, just a plain metal sword? Gotta research it before it can be wielded.)
** Possibly justified, as the metal would be alien and of interest, and who's to say the sword doesn't eat non-alien wielders? Better safe the sorry.
** Wait a minute, ''what'' "plain metal sword"? The only alien melee weapons you can collect are ''motorised drills''...
** This troper read a fanfic where alien weapons were DNA-locked to their owners. What the scientists were doing was to add humans to the list of permitted users (and while they were at it, they also added iron sights).

* Deconstructed in the novel {{Gateway}} by Frederik Pohl. Humanity finds a hollowed out asteroid orbiting within the inner Solar System. Exploring, they discover it contains almost a thousand ancient and abandoned faster-than-light alien starships of varying size, some working, many not. They find out how to make the ships go, but they have absolutely no idea how to direct them and can only select the preprogrammed destinations. They also have no idea how the ships work, how to fix them, what they run on or how much of what they run on is left. The 'prospectors' who take their chances on these ships for wealth and glory occasionally come back rich, more likely come back empty handed, often come back dead or in most cases, never come back at all. The corporation that runs the operations only makes this lethal lottery more dangerous with their futile attempts at 'reverse engineering.' Much of the novel concerns the underlying terror of not knowing where you're going, on a starship whose technology you can't understand.

** Played in crossover fic XSGCOM. Humans are specialy designed to be able to use Ancient technology because [[spoiler: they are Ancient bio weapons, designed to fight Wraith and Ori]]

* Averted and yet played straight in the first season of the new ''DoctorWho''. From a stash of alien weapons gathered by a collector of such items, all but one are hopelessly broken, and the Doctor identifies one as hairdryer. The last one is in perfect working condition, though, and doesn't even need fiddling with the sonic screwdriver to work.

* Semi-subverted in the novel {{Gateway}} by Frederik Pohl. Humanity finds a hollowed out asteroid orbiting within the inner Solar System. Exploring, they discover it contains almost a thousand ancient and abandoned faster-than-light alien starships of varying size, some working, many not. They find out how to make the ships go, but they have absolutely no idea how to direct them and can only select the preprogrammed destinations. They also have no idea how the ships work, how to fix them, what they run on or how much of what they run on is left. The 'prospectors' who take their chances on these ships for wealth and glory occasionally come back rich, more likely come back empty handed, often come back dead or in most cases, never come back at all. The corporation that runs the operations only makes this lethal lottery more dangerous with their futile attempts at 'reverse engineering.' Much of the novel concerns the underlying terror of not knowing where you're going, on a starship whose technology you can't understand.

* Miyazaki's ''Castle in the Sky,'' though not involving aliens, uses the same trope.

** In ''Independence Day''. Here it has been studied for the past 40 years - but not by the person who piloted it. And the ones who did study it got the directions reversed. Note that the craft has a convenient joystick when the aliens could ''control a human brain'' by touch.

* Averted in TabletopRPG ''[=CthulhuTech=]'': for the expressed purpose of avoiding this trope, the alien Migou design their guns and mecha to require no less than six limbs to operate.

* Lampshaded in at least one episode of Invader Zim. Dib was hacking into an Irken ship and said "I sure hope the Irkens happen to have the same Operating System as I do."

If the alien's transmogrifier has been captured--and was not destroyed in a huge explosion--you will almost certainly want to turn it on the enemy. This could, in principle, be difficult. Alien technologies are, well, ''alien'', and it might be hard to figure out how they work, or do basic maintenance and troubleshooting, let alone repair major damage. After all, Americans have trouble figuring out how to operate a rice cooker with Japanese instructions, let alone an alien spaceship.

* In the show ''{{Aquila}}'' two school kids find a small alien ship, with a dead Roman Centurion in it, it's perfectly tuned for humans but the downside is that its controls are in Latin, later they figure out that you can change the language to English thus making it a lot easier to control. So it?8364;™s an alien vessel, tuned for humans, been underground for at least 2000 years plus however long it was before the Centurion found it and it can be configured for modern languages, neat.

* Subverted in the novel {{Gateway}} by Frederik Pohl. Humanity finds a hollowed out asteroid orbiting within the inner Solar System. Exploring, they discover it contains almost a thousand ancient and abandoned faster-than-light alien ships of varying size, some working, many not. They find out how to make the ships go, but they have absolutely no idea how to direct them and can only select the preprogrammed destinations. They also have no idea how the ships work, how to fix them, what they run on or how much of what they run on is left. The 'prospectors' who take their chances on these ships for wealth and glory occasionally come back rich, more likely come back empty handed, often come back dead or in most cases, never come back at all. The corporation that runs the operations only makes this lethal lottery more dangerous with their futile attempts at 'reverse engineering.' Much of the novel concerns the underlying terror of not knowing where you're going, on a craft whose technology you can't understand.

* Semi-subverted in the novel {{Gateway}} by Frederik Pohl. Humanity finds a hollowed out asteroid orbiting within the inner Solar System. Exploring, they discover it contains almost a thousand faster-than-light alien ships of varying size, some working many not. They find out how to make the ships go, but they have absolutely no idea how to direct them and can only select the preprogrammed destinations. They also have no idea how the ships work, how to fix them, what they run on or how much of what they run on is left. The 'prospectors' who take their chances on these ships for wealth and glory occasionally come back rich, more likely come back poor, often come back dead or in most cases, never come back at all. The corporation that runs the operations only makes this lethal lottery more dangerous with their futile attempts at 'reverse engineering.' Much of the novel concerns the underlying terror of not knowing where you're going on a craft whose technology you can't understand.

* Semi-subverted in the novel {{Gateway}} by Frederik Pohl. Humanity finds a hollowed out asteroid orbiting in the inner Solar System. Exploring, they discover within it a thousand odd faster-than-light alien ships of varying size, some working many not. They find out how to make the ships go, but they have no idea how to direct them and can only select the preprogrammed destinations. They also have no idea how the ships work, how to fix them, what they run on or how much of what they run on is left. The 'prospectors' who take their chances or these ships for wealth and glory can occasionally come back rich, more likely come back poor, often come back dead or in most cases, never come back at all. The corporation that runs the operations only makes this lethal lottery more dangerous with their futile attempts of 'reverse engineering.' Much of the novel concerns the underlying terror of not knowing where you're going.

* In the show ''{{Aquila}}'' two school kids find a small alien ship, with a dead Roman Centurion in it, it's perfectly tuned for humans but the downside is that its controls are in Latin, later they figure out that you can change the language to English thus making it a lot easier to control. So it?8364;™s an alien vessel, tuned for humans, been underground for at least 2000 years plus however long it was before the Centurion found it and it can be configured for modern languages, neat.

** Another example of this is [[spoiler:the lost planet Illos. Even after thousands of years with nobody there, everything from elevators to VI computers are still working. Of course, the VI is very degraded, and it supposedly shut down nonessential systems and life support to keep things going, but did you seen [[RagnarokProofing how much moss was on its interface panel]]?]]

** Olayed in crossover fic XSGCOM. Humans are specialy designed to be able to use Ancient technology because [[spoiler: they are Ancient bio weapons, designed to fight Wraith and Ori]]