[[quoteright:250:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/1046_terra_nova_strike_force_centauri_dos_front_cover.jpg]]

''Terra Nova: Strike Force Centauri'' is a 1996 PoweredArmor combat SimulationGame developed by Creator/LookingGlassStudios. Set on the various planets and moons of the Alpha Centauri star system under colonisation, the game revolves around teams of powered armor pilots, led by PlayerCharacter Nikola ap Io, being deployed against pirate forces that threaten the safety and prosperity of outlying settlements. However, a greater threat is on the horizon...

A fansite of the game can be found [[http://www.ttlg.com/tnova/ here]].

This is one of the games re-released by Creator/NightdiveStudios in TheNewTens. It can be found on Website/GogDotCom: [[https://www.gog.com/game/terra_nova_strike_force_centauri]] and Platform/{{Steam}}: [[https://store.steampowered.com/app/368600/Terra_Nova_Strike_Force_Centauri/]]

Not to be confused with the television series ''Series/TerraNova''.


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!!Tropes seen in the game:

* AIBreaker: The game's enemies cannot readily handle the simple tactic of circle-strafing around them.
* AllThereInTheManual: There's an extensive amount of BackStory accessible through the in-game terminal between missions, detailing the rise of the Hegemony, the exodus of the Jovian colonists from the Solar system and the various Clans, as well as the environments and native life of Alpha Centauri's inhabited worlds.
* AcePilot: Of a sorts. Graciela "Angel" Gomez, one of the weapons specialists, stands out: her kill count will likely exceed all other AI squaddies and her average accuracy can almost match a competent player. If you can keep her alive through the campaign, she is invaluable in the more difficult later missions.
* AllPlanetsAreEarthlike: [[AvertedTrope Averted]]. While [=NewHope=] is noted as being very earthlike, there's also the much colder and inclement Thatcher, and Saara, which is essentially uninhabitable.
* AnyoneCanDie: [[ZigZaggedTrope Zig-zagged.]] The teammates who appear in cutscenes have PlotArmor,[[spoiler: and only one dies as a result of a scripted event, with two other teammates leaving in cutscenes, Walker and Ashford.]] All other squad members are fair game and tactical foresight is required to ensure their survival.
* ArmCannon: PBA weapons are mounted in the armor's wrists. Scout suits can have one in each arm, the other suits two, with some weapons taking up two slots or being restricted to the Heavy suit specifically.
* AttackDrone: The game likes to throw groups of these at you to distract you from more serious threats. Friendly drones are limited to spying and ActionBomb duty.
* CallSign: The team roster on your terminal shows that each character has one, [[GameplayAndStorySegregation but none of them are ever used in cutscenes, and rarely in-game]] ("Steady" Steadman refers to herself as such in some of her voice lines). At least one character is noted as hating hers: Cassandra "Siren" Mylonas, who suffered a throat injury at the hands of the pirates and has [[VocalDissonance a prosthetic larynx.]]
* CallASmeerpARabbit: Native life on Centauri's worlds is described as being roughly analogous to Earth's, and they are referred to as whatever they most resemble.
* DropPod: The game's powered armor doubles as one during the final descent phase of the deployment at the start of each mission.
* JackOfAllStats: The Standard PBA Suit, seen on the cover art and many cutscenes. It's more durable and can carry more weapons then the Scout Suit, while being more mobile and having longer-ranged sensors then the Heavy Suit. Unless you specifically need the Scout Suit for the sensor range, the Standard Suit suffices for much of the earlier missions.
* FishOutOfTemporalWater: Maggie is this. She was one of the original Jovian colonists who left the system over two hundred years before the game's events, but her ship went off course and she was stuck as a HumanPopsicle for most of that time. Biologically, she's still 31. Thankfully her husband and children were stuck with her and presumably also did not age.
* FullMotionVideo: The [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Y7H_vIiUU4 live-action cutscenes]]. (However, interior backdrops or animated cutscenes of vehicles, exteriors, etc. are CGI.) Rather infamously, Looking Glass Studios invested quite a lot into making these (since they were all the rage in mid-1990s games), but the financial losses from this and ''Terra Nova'' sales underperforming led to long-term financial issues for the developer.
* FunWithAcronyms: Aside from "PBA" below, there's also SFC, short for Strike Force Centauri, used by squad members when referring to the group as a whole.
* GameplayAllyImmortality: [[AvertedTrope Averted]], whether they actually can ''die'' depends on PlotArmor, but your allies can always be knocked out of the current mission.
* ElitesAreMoreGlamorous: Strike Force Centauri is made up of the best operatives in the system. We never actually see the regular forces.
* IHaveYourWife: Margaret "Drifter" [=McCulloch=], one of the team's recon specialists, has a husband and children missing, held hostage by pirates for much of the narrative. [[spoiler: They are rescued towards the end of the campaign, though no further mention is made of them. The last time we see Maggie, she is in high spirits.]]
* AMechByAnyOtherName: Well, not exactly a typical mech, but the combat suits are referred to as "[=PBA=]s" (an acronym for "Powered Battle Armor").
* TheMole: [[spoiler: You learn early on that SFC has one, leaking information to the Hegemony. Who it is isn't revealed until much later: Simon "Trash Can" Ashford. [[ChewingTheScenery He takes out his]] [[CardCarryingVillainy Villain Card]] [[ChewingTheScenery in the following cutscene.]]]]
* {{Nepotism}}: Sarah "Thirteen" Walker is given a FieldPromotion to squad commander, ahead of Nikola, following the [[spoiler: poisoning death of Arlen [=MacPherson=].]] [[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial The fact that her mother is on the Centauri Council has absolutely nothing to do with this.]] However, unlike most examples of this trope, she proves up to the job.
* MultinationalTeam: Strike Force Centauri is made up of operatives from the various Centauri clans' individual strike forces. The clans are explicitly described as coming from various Earth ethnic backgrounds.
* OutrunTheFireball: [[AvertedTrope Deliberately averted.]] [[spoiler: In the final mission, you are tasked with placing an experimental explosive charge to level a Centauri station occupied by the Hegemony. However, the detonator is in the hands of your commander and doesn't detonate until the cutscene afterwards.]]
* PoweredArmor: The game revolves around you piloting a fairly bulky but sophisticated military-grade combat model.
* RedHerring: The bartender at SFC's base often lets slip things that few people in the entire ''system'' would know, much less a bartender, making you think he might be TheMole, if a bad one. [[spoiler: He is actually a former Hegemony space pilot who deserted and came to Centauri, [[DefectorFromDecadence and means well.]] This proves to be a ChekhovsGun when the security codes in his fighter, hidden on Thatcher, are used to infiltrate a Heg base near the end of the game.]]
* RocketTagGameplay: Both your team and your enemies are {{Glass Cannon}}s, and battles resolve very quickly. Most missions can be completed in less then ten minutes, and some under five. The game was initially designed to be slower and more deliberate, and was changed near the end of development because of concerns that it wouldn't be fun.
* SceneryPorn: Despite the age of the game, the developers did their best to offer relatively realistically generated and [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CyA_evTJMRs life-like landscapes]], with highly varying environments. The draw distance alone is impressive for 1996, and even the particle effects are decent for the period.
* StuffBlowingUp: Often, thanks to various ordinance launchers in your loadout options. Enemies and buildings alike tend to suffer CriticalExistenceFailure upon running out of health and go boom.
* SiblingRivalry: Between Nikola ap Io and his older brother Brandt, who has been on the squad longer but is outranked by Nik.
* SimulationGame: Of a soldier piloting powered armor and engaging in tactical combat on a fairly huge battlefield with plenty of varying terrain.
* SlowLaser: [[AvertedTrope Averted]] by most of the energy weapons, including the actual laser, but played straight by the "Multipulsar" weapon, which fires a shotgun-esque spread of five red bolts.
* SpritePolygonMix: Friendly and enemy [=PBAs=] are rendered as sprites, while tanks and buildings are polygons.
* SuperSoldier: Though the normal [=PBAs=] used by the Hegemony are inferior to yours, they make up for it with their {{Cyborg}} clone soldiers, conditioned to feel no fear or hesitation. These are the most dangerous infantry you will face in the game, [[ArtificialStupidity though they are still vulnerable to the same tactics you used against the lowly pirates.]]
* TheQuietOne: Gaspard "Gags" Girraud, one of the team's electronics specialists. He speaks in [[TerseTalker a terse monotone,]] and whenever he says [[ThisIsGonnaSuck he has a bad feeling,]] the team listens, because he's always right. [[{{Telepathy}} It helps that he has a neural implant that allows him to read people's minds through physical contact.]]
* TheSquad: You generally don't fight alone, but as the leader of a team of 2-4 powered armor pilots.
** Also the subject of the toast which is the last line of the game:
---> "To the squad!"
---> "THE SQUAD!"
* TheWarOfEarthlyAggression: The meat of the plot.

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