History XUniverse / Tropes0ToF

* AbsoluteCleavage / BareYourMidriff / MsFanservice / PaintedOnPants (whew!): Saya Kho is frequently depicted as such. [[http://extreme.pcgameshardware.de/attachments/397450d1301531304-spieler-frauen-die-beliebtesten-frauen-charaktere-computerspielen-x3saya.jpg This image]] is on the back of ''X3: Gold Edition''.
* AbusivePrecursors / BenevolentPrecursors : The Ancients ''do'' have theoretically good goals, like doing something about that whole "Heat Death Of The Universe" ''thing'', and they consider the PortalNetwork they built and maintain a gift to the younger races. On the other hand, they've got a nasty habit of thinking about the younger races as one collective group, making them [[WellIntentionedExtremist frighteningly]] willing to toy with other species. Since their most direct method of manipulation involves switching gate pairs in the PortalNetwork, this means that they do things like start interplanetary wars seemingly ForTheLulz, [[YouCantGoHomeAgain separate colony ships from their home planets]], simply lock fleets in deep space with nowhere to go, or [[InferredHolocaust turn off the entire system of interstellar travel]]. On the gripping hand, that bit about shutting down the entire PortalNetwork also came in response to the [[AIIsACrapshoot Xenon terraformers, who have a bad habit of terraforming people out of existance]], [[OhCrap having control of a large portion of the galaxy]].

** The [[spoiler:Hub plot]] takes it UpToEleven. It's an entire Fetch ''Plot''.

* FantasticDrug: Spaceweed is a Teladi plant that is smoked or ingested and amounts to marijuana [-[[JustForFun/RecycledInSpace IN SPACE!]]-] Space fuel, on the other hand, is a street name or euphemism for Argon whiskey. Both are illegal in the Commonwealth[[note]]which is ironic in the case of space fuel, [[{{Hypocrite}} since you can see two distilleries in the Argon sectors of Herron's Nebula and Nyana's Hideout, and you can actually buy their distilleries from Argon shipyards]]. Spaceweed is legal in Teladi space, however[[/note]], and both are highly prized by players for use as trade goods to pacify the SpacePirate population.

* BloodSport: The Split are fond of arena deathmatchs. Taken to the next level in ''Xtended'', where the Split have created an incredibly violent version of the ''Film/TheCannonballRun'' [[RecycledInSpace in space]]. A random set of checkpoints are given to the racers at the start of the race, and they must fly through the checkpoints. Any time a pilot doesn't fire on another race when they have the opportunity, they lose points. When the winner crosses the finish line, all the racing ships will explode after 7 seconds. Because it has such a high mortality rate, the Split have declared it the [[ItsTheBestWhateverEver best sport ever.]]

* FantasticDrug: Spaceweed is a Teladi plant that is smoked or ingested and amounts to marijuana [-[[RecycledInSpace IN SPACE!]]-] Space fuel, on the other hand, is a street name or euphemism for Argon whiskey. Both are illegal in the Commonwealth[[note]]which is ironic in the case of space fuel, [[{{Hypocrite}} since you can see two distilleries in the Argon sectors of Herron's Nebula and Nyana's Hideout, and you can actually buy their distilleries from Argon shipyards]]. Spaceweed is legal in Teladi space, however[[/note]], and both are highly prized by players for use as trade goods to pacify the SpacePirate population.

** The Fragmentation Bomb Launcher. Yes, it does sound like a dangerous weapon but the gun drains up a good deal of energy from your ship, its firing rate and shot velocity are slow, and unless you actually manage to hit your target ''before'' the projectile detonates and unleashes its FlechetteStorm, you're not going to hit anything smaller than a corvette. What's more unfortunate about this weapon is that the FlechetteStorm lacks any AreaOfEffect damage whatsoever due in part of a programmer's oversight. The only thing good about this weapon is its high selling price, which makes for VendorTrash at the equipment docks.

* {{Expy}}:
** The Boron are essentially the [[Franchise/StarWars Mon Calamari]], but with a squid-like appearance and lacking the iron resolve and prowess that the Mon Calamari are touted for.
** The Kha'ak are essentially the X-Universe's version of the [[VideoGame/{{Elite}} Thargoids]]. Except unlike the Thargoids, the Kha'ak are practically impossible to attempt understanding them by any means.
** The Split are the X-Universe's version of the [[Franchise/StarTrek Klingons]]. Also, their culture is reminiscent of the [[TabletopGame/BattleTech Clans]].
** The Teladi share many similarities with the [[Franchise/StarTrek Ferengi]], with their devotion to [[MemeticMutation profitsss]] and even the restriction of their particular gender to travel away from their homeworld. The only key differences are their appearances (Ferengi are humanoid, Teladi are reptilian) and their lifestyle (female Ferengi are forbidden to leave their homeworld, female Teladi are ubiquitous in outer space and male Teladi often stay in their homeworld because unfertilized, unsupervised Teladi birth eggs would always hatch as female, though there do exist male Teladi in outer space).
** The Xenon are pretty much the [[Franchise/BattlestarGalactica Cylons]], except that they are faceless and had [[TurnedAgainstTheirMasters turned on their creators]] [[AIIsACrapshoot by means of a faulty software patch]] instead of [[UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom a person goading them to become self-sufficient]].
** Many mods base their ships on crafts from other games, with some modifications to make them a LawyerFriendlyCameo. The Xtra ship mod by Cadius, for example, features several new capital ships which are based on ships from ''VideoGame/NexusTheJupiterIncident''. Example: [[http://i.imgur.com/TaebsCR.jpg Terran Nagoya]] versus the [[http://i.imgur.com/fGf0Vl2.jpg Noah Colony Battleship]] - The ship's detail has been bumped up and textures are like those of other Terran ships, but the two are obviously the same design.

* ComputerVoice: [[FanNickname Betty]], the ship's computer and autopilot, uses a monotone female voice.

** Fatal collisions among NPC ships are commonplace. Fast NPC fighters tend to splat on the station they are attacking after a few minutes of fire. [[HoistByHisOwnPetard Unwanted self-destruction by launching a missile slower than their ship is also relatively common]]. Gets elevated to the power of itself if you activate time compression; the AI routines have trouble running 10x faster, and glitch out -- generally in more dramatic ways the faster the ship is. Expect to see fighters zig-zagging all over the place and capital ships ramming stations.
*** The player ship's autopilot appears to use the same lousy programming, leading many members of the community to jokingly dub it the "auto-pillock".
*** [[http://apricotmappingservice.com/autopillok.html Some believe the auto-pillock consists of a gerbil (or lemming) in a box, with a rough sketch of the sector map and a joystick.]]
*** Fighter craft love to smash themselves into capital ships when attacking them. In [[http://forum.egosoft.com/viewtopic.php?t=295405 a series of tests]] on the EGOSOFT forums, a player ordered swarms of fighters to attack a weaponless capital ship. Two waves, one of Busters and another of Mambas, suffered 50% losses because they were splatting themselves on the sides of their target.

*** On the opposite but equally stupid side, the ship's autopilot can sometimes become too aggressive about ''avoiding'' obstacles it has little chance of running into, especially solar power plants. This can lead to ships getting stuck or taking an extremely long time to get somewhere because they will enter a cycle of approaching an object then flying away from it, then turning around and approaching it again only to fly away again. It can also make trying to dock in a crowded sector, especially without SETA, extremely time-consuming.
** The player has a number of well-documented, non-exploit tricks available to him in combat that the AI is evidently not programmed to use, such as strafing and actually [[MacrossMissileMassacre launching missile barrages from [=M7M=]- and M8-class ships]], which are supposed to do that in the first place.
*** The latter behavior is corrected in ''Albion Prelude'' to a rather frightening degree. As long as they can maintain their stores of ammunition, AI missile bombers and frigates will not hesitate to pour long-range ordnance into a sector until everything in it has been purged of life.

** Taken UpToEleven. Not only would the economy not work in RealLife, ''it doesn't work InUniverse either''. The most infamous example is the Terrans, whose economy is perpetually stagnated, with goods sitting in factories unsold. Doesn't help that the Terran stations and sectors are ''massive'' and have a docking corridor that's the size of a Commonwealth station; anything that gets in the way will cause a docking trading ship to avert and restart its docking path. The game's GOD engine (regulates the economy, and what is spawned/removed) also likes to destroy Terran stations because they don't receive their necessary resources, which happens a lot since there will be 3-4 sectors between a technology factory and the ore or food that it needs to run. Terrans fail civil planning forever.
** This is an opportunity in disguise. The Terrans are merely waiting for someone (i.e. you) to revitalize their economy by placing in their sectors factories that produce what their stations lack; doing this properly can bring stupid amounts of money to entrepreneur-type players.
*** Even then, there's never enough weapons to go around unless the player builds his own.
** Less well-known is the fact that the Commonwealth will also crash without player intervention. The most common symptom is the removal of both TractorBeam factories in the game (no station buys them, so traders don't trade with them), which forces the player to build and feed an entire SpaceStation for something he only ever needs one of.

* AsLongAsItSoundsForeign: The person who discovered the theory that made jump gates possible was supposedly a Japanese man named "Kazuko Ashizava". There is no "va" sound in Japanese. Not to mention that "Kazuko" is a girl's name. There's also a Dr. Akira Desu. That comes out as "Dr. I am Akira".

** The ATF M1 Woden is a variant on their primary M1, the Odin. It trades off fighter capacity for additional weapons power. [[DummiedOut It doesn't spawn]] in vanilla ''[=X3TC=]'', but it did make it into ''Albion Prelude''.

** One forum member developed a software capable to visualize 3D models and stats of Ships, Stations and Missiles (and even some Easter Eggs) from X2 to X3. If you look at the Terran Conflict files, you can find the Heavy Fighter ''Aamon Prototype'' and the Super-Destroyer ''Valhalla''. Those ships are [[DummiedOut not used in that game]], but actually appear in the ''Albion Predule'' {{Mission Pack Sequel}}. It's also possibile to create these ships in-game using the [[LevelEditor Galaxy Editor]].

*** ''X3: Farnham's Legacy''. $4.99 (or free for people who already own Albion Prelude). Adds a new collection of sectors, new exploration devices, and an expanded diplomacy system.

* CompilationRerelease[=/=]LimitedSpecialCollectorsUltimateEdition: The ''X-Superbox''. It contains very high-quality versions of the game's soundtrack, 3 fan-made soundtracks, the [[AllThereInTheManual X-Encyclopedia]], and every ''X-Universe'' game made - when ''Albion Prelude'' came out, owners of the Superbox got the normally $9.99 expansion pack for free.

* DummiedOut: [[http://x3wiki.com/index.php/Non-Vanilla_Ships A couple dozen ships]] don't spawn in vanilla ''Terran Conflict'', though most were never actually finished and use other ships as placeholders. The Valhalla and Woden, on the other hand...

* EarlyBirdCameo[=/=]ProductionForeshadowing:

** The Teladi Kestrel is the fastest ship to be purchasable from its respective race's shipyards (in fact, it's the fourth fastest overall in the game). It's not recommended to use auto-pilot and SETA at the same time because it can barely control itself at such speeds and carries a high risk of colliding with another object. It's really only good at barging through sectors hopefully unscathed because like all M5s, it won't last long in even an M4 dogfight. Although in the hands of a good fighter-jock-type player it makes a decent GradualGrinder: having better guns than most M5s, coupled with the class's agility and speed, means it can handle itself against anything up to M3 if you keep to the side so you can attack from blind spots. Plus, since it comes with a rear turret, it can shake off any missile that tries to catch it: the Rapier missile is the only one that can catch up with the Kestrel thanks to being the fastest out of any counterpart at a blistering 657m/s (until ''Albion Prelude'', where the still pathetically weak Mosquito missile took the title as the fastest at 700m/s) and doing a reasonable 1MJ of damage.

* FrickinLaserBeams: Kyon Emitters, as well as the developer-disabled Phased Array Laser/Plasma Beam/Tri-Beam Laser/Fusion Beam Cannons.

** Kha'ak craft take directed-energy weaponry to one extreme with their (near) HitScan Kyon Emitters. While this makes them terribly effective against missiles (especially if they aren't of the [[RecursiveAmmo Swarm variety]]) and any craft below M7-class, they don't rely on any weaponry other than their own, they don't scale well against the bigger capital ships, and the shielding and hull strength of Kha'ak ships are so painfully below average (with the exception of their M1 carrier and M2 destroyer) that they can easily be defeated by a concentrated assault of [[MacrossMissileMassacre missile barrages]] and [[WaveMotionGun Wave Motion Guns]]. Or, better yet, [[AttackDrone fighter drone]] [[ZergRush swarms]].

* EvilVersusEvil: The Xenon Vs. the Kha'ak, if the Kha'ak were to jump in a sector the Xenon are in. Especially if it's a Xenon-controlled sector. Usually the Kha'ak gain a distinct advantage over the Xenon due to their near HitScan laser beams, unless the Xenon ZergRush them.

** Finally, [[AIIsACrapshoot Xenon]] and [[HordeOfAlienLocusts Kha'ak]] ships are The Horde, being hive-minded races. They're subpar in most respects, but Xenon ships can be replicated quickly and cheaply with the PlayerHeadquarters, making them popular among late-game players. Kha'ak ships aren't much used, since they require unique weapons that need to be farmed - although the almost-HitScan ability of said weapons can entice some players.

** Teladi ships are {{Mighty Glacier}}s, slow but durable with respectable firepower. They have significantly increased cargo space for greater [[MemeticMutation profitsss]]. Because of this, besides being good at trading, they are the best ships for MacrossMissileMassacre.

* AliensSpeakingEnglish:
** All species speak a version of Japanese. TranslationConvention makes them all speak in English (or whichever language your game is set to).
** Lampshaded in ''Farnham's Legend'' with Kyle Brennan being surprised and confused to be greeted in pidgin Japanese by a Teladi.

* EverythingsBetterWithSpinning:
** One forum member discovered that corkscrewing, or flying in a spiral by putting his joystick to the stops on all three axes, was a pretty effective evasive maneuver in a fighter. He was even able to survive a mob of Kha'ak fighters in a Split Mamba Vanguard.
** Many ship models have spinning components, just because. Some (like on the OTAS M2 Boreas) are justified by looking like sensor dishes, or by being an engine turbine in the case of the Boron Megalodon.
** Back in the days of the first game, both the Terran capital ship you start from and the planet-killer you have to destroy in the endgame have unreasonably ''huge'' spinning parts for no observable reason.
** The [=OTAS=] Venti M3 fighter has twin gatling-style guns that even rotate when it fires.

** Most of the race-neutral weapons like High Energy Plasma Throwers, Particle Accelerator Cannons, and Photon Pulse Cannons are all boring, but practical due to how common they are (There's over a dozen PPC factores in the game, but only 3-5 factories for Phased Shockwave Generators, for example).

* DroneDeployer: In vanilla, NPC freighters frequently carry a dozen or so fighter drones and deploy them as distractions upon being attacked. PlayerMooks equipped with Fight Command Software Mk2 and using Sector Trader, Commercial Agent, or Commodity Logistics Software will automatically buy drones for this upon reaching a certain experience level. PlayerMooks tend to have a better escape rate since most players fit their trade ships with jumpdrives.

* AreaOfEffect: Phased Shockwave Generators and Plasma Burst Generators.

* FutureImperfect: For around six hundred years most Argon believed Earth to be a myth perpetrated by the Goners, due to their progenitors having deleted all mention of Earth from their history to prevent anyone from leading the terraformers back there. [[PlayerCharacter Kyle Brennan]]'s [[{{Understatement}} little mishap]] in ''X: Beyond the Frontier'' proved the Goners were right.

** The Boron are a [[TheKingdom constitutional monarchy]]/parliamentary democracy hybrid not unlike the United Kingdom: the queen is a figurehead for the parliament.

* EarlyBirdCameo[=/=]ProductionForeshadowing: One forum member developed a software capable to visualize 3D models and stats of Ships, Stations and Missiles (and even some Easter Eggs) from X2 to X3. If you look at the Terran Conflict files, you can find the Heavy Fighter ''Aamon Prototype'' and the Super-Destroyer ''Valhalla''. Those ships are not used in that game, but actually appear in the ''Albion Predule'' {{Mission Pack Sequel}}. It's also possibile to create these ships in-game using the [[LevelEditor Galaxy Editor]].

* JustForFun/AbusingTheKardashevScaleForFunAndProfit: The Outsiders in the backstory and Encyclopedia are somewhere above Type V, and the Ancients are borderline Type [=IVs=]. DysonSphere and Matrioshka Brain civilizations are mentioned, and they fit into the borderline Type [=IIs=]. However, all the races the player actually interacts with are at best Type I (as an example, the Terran Osaka's weapons reactor produces just under 9 GW).

* BlackBox: The jumpgates play with this trope. While operation is terribly easy -- push a spaceship in one gate, and it'll pop out the other gate in the pair a few seconds later, no matter how far away -- no one in the Commonwealth understands anything but the lies-to-children version of how they work. While there are a few scientists capable of repairing damaged gates, no one even thinks about trying replication or reconfiguration, and the irregular outages or changes in the system caused by meddling precursors is treated like mystery or even legend where it's not just a natural risk of the gates. The species that actually made the system in the first place not only consider it [[TheWorldIsNotReady outside of the range of understanding of the normal races]], they think it's impossible for a species to understand without getting [[AbusingTheKardashevScaleForFunAndProfit a few points higher on the Kardashev scale]]. Then the [[HumansAreSpecial Terran humans get involved]], and not only get the theory down and create a new gate on their own, but also create a Jumpdrive that's a ''separate'' Black Box to everyone else in the setting.