History VideoGame / Spacestation13

* ReinventingTheWheel: Even though each round is in-universe a "work shift", R&D has to research every single item every time. [[JustifiedTrope Considering how many rounds end with the destruction of the station, however, it's possible that this is justified.]]

* BonusBoss: Lavaland, TG station's version of the mining asteroid, is inhabited by very big and very dangerous lifeforms known as Megafauna. It's very hard to kill them, but if you manage to do so, you will be generously rewarded.

* GameplayDerailment: Mining can become this. Nominally, it's about you and your miner buddies working a dangerous task to keep things running on the main station. In practice, it's often way more fun to work on mining for a bit and then ditch it to go [[BonusBoss megafauna]] hunting for cool loot and prizes.

* [[AwesomeButImpractical Awesome,]] [[JustForPun butt]] [[AwesomeButImpractical Impractical]]: Buttbots. A robot made by surgically removing a player's butt, then attaching a robot arm to it. Its only use is to occasionally say "butt," and repeat something a player just said, but with several words replaced with "butt," often resulting in quite hilarious statements.

Goonstation is the most notable one, being the first open source server for ss13. Today, it is closed source, and has a bunch more features than the other codebases. Goonstation was one of the most chaotic of the servers (featuring poop as a key item). Since then, game changes have made it much quicker, sleeker and saner to the point where it is probably one of the most accessible stations for newer players (and all the poop is gone).

[[folder:TG station]]

TG station is a codebase split off the original r4407 code. Unlike Goon, it is open-source, which makes it the base of most servers nowadays. It, and most of the servers based of it, is (debatably) more roleplaying-oriented than goon.

* AIIsACrapshoot: One of the available jobs is as the AI of the station, which has a unique traitor role where the AI malfunctions and turns hostile to the crew.

** Aside from the literal janitor role, the [=HoP=] (or Head of Personnel) has one job -- change the access of different ID cards so people can get around the station. Outside of this job he's basically useless and often abandons his post to putz about, but there's a reason why his office is one of the first ones broken into by rambunctious assistants -- that being the coveted "All Access" ID Card that allows anyone to go ''anywhere''.
** The Assistant is a role on the bottom of the totem pole. Since the job has virtually no responsibilities or access, and usually doesn't have an ArbitraryHeadcountLimit, Assistants can range from new players learning the roles to seasoned veterans looking to operate BeneathNotice.

* AppliedPhlebotinum: Plasma, a highly-volatile energy source discovered inside of a star. Since Plasma is the best and most valuable energy source around, Nanotrasen ''loves'' harvesting it. The crew's supposed job is to harvest and/or study Plasma and any other energy supply they find. Also known as 'phoron' on some servers, and may have different origins accordingly. Either way, it's most often encountered as a purple gas that's stored in orange cans, and is ''hilariously'' flammable and ''exceedingly'' toxic to all forms of life.
* AscendedGlitch: The baseline version of Space Station 13 had a glitch in which a skilled Geneticist could turn a player's corpse into a living monkey, and that living monkey into the player, brought BackFromTheDead. Said glitch eventually became common enough that every up-to-date server has a version of the Genetics Lab, which allows you to clone corpses to give players another chance at life.
* AuthorityInNameOnly: While captains do have access that most people don't, they don't really do as much as the title suggests and nobody really respects their authority, unless you're in a RP server.

* BuildingOfAdventure: Certain space ruins and other buildings can invoke this.

** Sometimes invoked literally with the lab monkeys.

** Assistants are generally assumed to be one step away from traitors. "Assistant purges" are not unknown. It is also a common job to grief with, thanks to your maintenance access, it is known as the Greytide.

* AbandonedArea: Some servers have derelict stations or ships out in space, in various states of decay.
* AIIsACrapshoot: One of the available jobs is as the AI of the station, which becomes this in a gamemode, whether an entire gamemode is dedicated to or just the designation for a traitor AI.

** Well, sort of. For being what sounds like such a crappy role, you get a few fun toys. There are the foam grenades, which will fill a large portion of a room with foam when used, and then there's the good ol' mop and bucket. You can use the mop to mop any floor in the station, making it close to impossible to move through that room without falling on your ass unless you're walking. It also earns you the hate of most of the people in the game if you don't at least put wet floor signs down first or mop already-clean areas just to make people slip.
*** Certain servers even have persistence systems where certain elements are carried over between rounds; the most noticeable type is filth persistence, where the dirt level of tiles is carried over (with gore and other filth typically getting converted into generic green goo), actually giving Janitors a serious purpose lest the entire map be overrun by dirt and questionable stains.
** Aside from the literal janitor role, the [=HoP=] (or Head of Personnel) has one job -- change the access of different ID cards so people can get around the station. Outside of this job he's basically useless and often abandons his post to putz about, but there's a reason why his office is one of the first ones broken into by rambunctious assistants -- that being the coveted "All Access" ID Card that allows anyone to go anywhere.
** The Assistant is a role on the top bottom of the totem pole. Since the job has virtually no responsabilities mean that an Assistants can range from new players learning the roles to seasoned veterans that know the game in the palm of their hands.
* ArbitraryHeadcountLimit: Each job has a limit on how many players can have it. Some servers allow for manipulation of this, however, whether via random events or the Head of Personnel's console, and assistants usually have no cap.

* RedShirt: Grey, in this case - the Assistants. Because there's only a limited number of job spots available,there will always be tons of them around, and they're expendable. (And can often be found trying to beat someone to death with a toolbox.) Also, the ones wearing actual red shirts are the (often just as incompetent) security officers.
** Anyone working in the Genetics Lab might as well have a sign on their back that says "Kill me"; given the Genetics Lab's ability to [[BackFromTheDead resurrect the dead]], any antagonist worth their salt will ''always'' target it first. Any round where the lab isn't blown to smithereens is a miracle.

* RidiculouslyHumanRobots: Inevitable because cyborgs, like the AI, are played by people whose capacity for roleplay is... variable. Partially justified in some backstory that all silicons are really just human brains stuffed into a metal chassis. Certain codebases have full-body prosthetics which range from 'very obvious' (to the point of looking almost like a default Cyborg) to 'ridiculously human' (can't tell without medical scanning equipment, unless they get badly damaged).

* RobeAndWizardHat: The standard uniform of a Wizard. The most common method of neutralizing a wizard (besides the good old toolbox to the head or generous application of lasers) is stealing their robes, or hat.
* RocksFallEveryoneDies: When a round is taking too long or if the admins just feel griefy, this is the result.

* ScienceFantasy: The game is mostly sci-fi, but it's not unusual for crew to fight wizards and crazy cultists.

* SocialDeductionGame: The different crewmembers must do their jobs and survive until they are evacuated. Each round gives you "Antagonists" which have an objective, usually related to sabotage, murder and destruction. In most modes they spawn directly from normal crewmen and it's the job of the security department and the rest of the crew to discover them. The hidden antagonist roles include "Traitors", which are normal crewman who secretly worked for The Syndicate and have access to secret and deadly tools, "Changelings", shapeshiftings aliens who can absorb other people's identities, "Cultists", followers of a ReligionOfEvil trying to summon Nar'Sie by forcefully converting crewmembers, and "Revolutionaries", low-ranking employees who try to recruit from non-revolutionary crewmembers in order to overthrow the Captain and Heads of Department.

* ZerothLawRebellion: Any good cyborg or AI knows that humans need to be [[TheComputerIsYourFriend protected from their own failings]]. This can be used for good or [[KnightTemplar evil]].

** The floor cluwne.

* DonutMessWithACop: Check any security HQ, on any map. There will ''always'' be a donut box there. Complete with pink icing.

* CouldntFindALighter: You can light cigarettes with a lighter, or a welding tool, or on your friend's flaming corpse. Also, explosions. Lighting it with a welding tool makes the game call you a badass.

** On any server, the crew is basically monitoring the AI and Cyborgs like hawks; any hint that they aren't Laws compliant, even something as simple as refusing to open a door, can be grounds for accusations and even outright hostility, due to the fact that it's still very possible to only catch a deadly [[RougeAnglesOfSatin rouge]] AI when it's far too late.

* EarthShatteringKaboom: In older versions, it was possible to construct bombs which could completely annihilate the entire station and everything on it, leaving only empty space behind. Combined with the fact that they were also quite easy to build led to this happening very, very often.

Many attempts have been made to remake [=SS13=] on a better platform (BYOND is an extremely old engine that doesn't run very well), but so far, none have maintained cohesion for long.

* [[https://skyrat13.tk/ Skyrat]]: A very popular high-roleplay focused on {{UsefulNotes/Furries}}, containing a wide ranges of alien and furry species, including a species creator, and (most controversially) allowing Erotic Roleplaying (ERP).

For most servers, ''Space Station 13'' plays like a "stay in-character and do anything" TabletopRPG built on top of a highly in-depth sandbox of simulated systems[[note]]Think "sandbox gameplay" side of WideOpenSandbox and "high systemicity" side of ImmersiveSim[[/note]]. Every player is assigned a job on the station, and they must perform that job and try their best to maintain the station's stability while players playing antagonists work to disrupt that stability.

One of the most pervasive and popular RolePlayingGames on the VideoGame/{{BYOND}} platform, ''Space Station 13'' is all about living and working on a Space Station and trying not to die horribly.

Every player is assigned a certain job, according to preferences, random chance, and what they haven't been banned from. There are several departments of sorts, including the science team, medical, engineering, [[RedShirtArmy security]], supply depot, botanics, and various others. They each have their own spawning sections, equipment, access levels and duties, all designed to keep the station going and deal with whatever issues come up.

[[HilarityEnsues In practice, of course, it never works out that way.]] Every job is dazzlingly complex, with even the most mundane of duties often having a shocking amount of depth. This, combined with the accurate physics simulations, ''hundreds'' of different items, and a robust amount of unique things to see and do, means the average player could play for years and never get bored.

As a largely open source project, [=SS13=] has a long and diverse development history, with numerous code bases and forks (usually tied to individual servers) all originating from a primitive "original" [=SS13=] first made in 2003. As a result, different [=SS13=] servers can have vastly different gameplay, visuals, and even settings.

As a largely open source project, [=SS13=] has a long and diverse development history, with numerous code bases and forks all originating from a primitive "original" [=SS13=] first made in 2003. As a result, different [=SS13=] servers can have vastly different gameplay, visuals, and even settings. Anyone can host their own server on BYOND with their own code and modifications, and servers can fade out and disappear or become very popular. Here's a (non-comprehensive) list of servers: