In the year 2160, the universe is run by corrupt corporations and governments that will do anything in order to get what they want. On a space station, Devlin McCormack has just buried his estranged son, only to receive news afterwards that he was murdered. Devlin seeks to unravel the conspiracy behind his son's murder.
This Video Game contains examples of:
- Action Dad: Devlin's son Danny dies at the beginning of the game, and Devlin attends the funeral expressing his regret for not being a good father. Shortly afterwards, he receives a note revealing that Danny's death is not an accident, but a murder. At that moment, Devlin turns into this trope, vowing to find out who killed Danny and kill the murderer.
- All There in the Manual: The game came with a 12-page comic book produced especially to be packaged with the game. It details the backstory of Devlin McCormack and is family. Devlin is the sole survivor of an attack on his ship during the Company Wars, sustaining permanent damage to his lungs due to smoke inhalation. Returning home an unable to work, (making him a social outcast in the company-centric colony) Devlin becomes severely depressed, combined with survivor's guilt. The toll of this drives Danny to leave home. Devlin's wife commits suicide shortly thereafter. The comic ends with Devlin arriving at the space station for Danny's funeral.
- Basement-Dweller: Rowland reveals himself as this. He says that he lived with his mother before coming to work at the space station. He is rather childish, immature, lazy, fat, has a chocolate addiction, and is a hypochondriac.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Captain Shannon seems to be a nice guy, giving a eulogy to Danny, Devlin's son, and letting Devlin say something at the funeral. He seems to care very much about the crew (notwithstanding some hostilities between him and the engineer Meyer), and is a little condescending towards Devlin, on the grounds that Devlin is middle-aged and Shannon is in his prime. Shannon also seems to be rather anal about the rules. Then, when Kaufmann is murdered, Shannon blames Devlin for the murder, ignores Devlin's protests of innocence, has Devlin imprisoned, and decides to cover up the murder, keeping it between himself, LaPaz, and Ward. So you would think, what a sleazy guy, right? Then Devlin and Shannon have a confrontation later on and it is revealed that Shannon blames Devlin for the death of Shannon's wife, so he murdered Danny as part of his revenge, then he murdered Kaufmann to frame Devlin, and now he is going to murder Devlin. Now that is a Bastard in Sheep's Clothing! Good thing Meyer intervenes before anything else happens.
- Bittersweet Ending: Devlin found out who killed his son Danny, and the murderer is dead. The xenomorphs have been destroyed and the space station and asteroid have been blown to smithereens. Unfortunately, out of the 20 people making up the crew, Devlin, LaPaz, and Meyer are the only survivors. Their fates are left hanging. The matter of LaPaz being pregnant, and the matter of her unborn child being a human, xenomorph, or a hybrid is left hanging.
- Bury Your Gays: Devlin discovers that his dead son Danny was gay, and is surprised because he and Danny had been so distant from each other that Devlin simply did not have a clue. He also finds out that Kaufmann is gay and that he was Danny's boyfriend. Kaufmann and Devlin get into a shouting match because Kaufmann thinks Devlin disapproves of the relationship. Devlin, on his part, feels that he would not have held that against Danny. Sadly, Kaufmann is found dead and disemboweled shortly afterwards. Devlin finds out later that Captain Shannon killed Danny and Kaufmann. Why? Because Shannon blames Devlin for the death of Shannon's wife, and so he murdered Danny for revenge. Shannon killed Kaufmann to frame Devlin. Naturally, Shannon is planning to kill Devlin. Despite this reasoning, Danny and Kaufmann are the first characters confirmed dead, and they were both gay, so the trope still stands.
- Chekhov's Gun: Every item you pick up is this. Yes, every single item you pick will have a use in one form or another. In the case of some of the items, it is not too difficult to figure out what to use them on. For other items, it will be difficult to figure out what to use them on.
- Chekhov's Gunman: Brooks seems to have only a small role in the game. Later, she gets killed off trying to stop a berserk Ward and LaPaz drags her body out of the corridor. Later, when you get to the shuttle, you find out that the NavCom chip was destroyed, effectively crippling the shuttle. However, LaPaz reveals that there is a backup chip located in Brooks's brain, which explains why LaPaz dragged Brooks' body out of a corridor that had to be sealed shortly afterwards.
- Coming-Out Story: Devlin is investigating the death of his son Danny. In the course of the investigation, he discovers that his son Danny was gay and was in a relationship (that involved love letters) with Kaufmann. Shortly after this, Kaufmann confronts Devlin. Kaufmann confirms that he and Danny are both gay. Both of them get into a shouting match about how Devlin drove away Danny and that Devlin is just some anti-gay bigot who is now thinking that Kaufmann murdered Danny over a lover's tiff. When left alone, Devlin is left feeling guilty over being a poor father for Danny, and that they had been so distant that he simply had no idea that Danny was gay. Devlin also feels that Danny could have told him about this, and that he would not have been angry with Danny for that.
- Dark and Troubled Past: Devlin McCormack fought as a soldier in the Corporation War, which apparently left him with issues. He admits that he was not a good father to his son Danny and that he in fact drove him away. Interestingly enough, Danny's death and the investigation of it is what drives Devlin for a portion of the game. Also, the local Jerkass claims that Devlin drove his wife to suicide, which would indicate that Devlin may not have been a good husband. Of course, it is hard to say that really is the case, or if there is more to that story than that.
- Everybody's Dead, Dave: The game starts off with 20 characters on a space station. By the end of the game, Devlin, Meyer, and LaPaz are the only characters still alive.
- Evil Brit: Captain Shannon happens to be evil as well as speaking English with a posh British accent.
- Fiery Redhead: Brooks plays this trope straight to a T. She can cuss, she can fight, she can have sex, she can do a lot.
- It May Help You on Your Quest: LaPaz will give Devlin keys to open the cupboard in Danny's room. Also, Ward will give you a rotten biscuit to spite you later on. In both cases, the items are immediately useful in some way.
- Japan Takes Over the World: The One Nation Under Copyright that the main characters (who are mostly British, aside from the Irish protagonist) belong to/work for is called Kobayashi.
- Jerkass: The security guard Ward is openly racist, sexist, and whatever term you would like to apply. Just about everything that comes out of his mouth is an insult. Practically nobody likes him, and at least one character refers to him as a redneck and says that he is so dumb that insults will just fly right over his head. Bonus points for the fact that he hates the Irish main character Devlin McCormack because his first name is Malachi, an Irish first name.
- The Lancer: The engineer Meyer is put in this role for The Hero Devlin McCormack. Meyer loves to cuss. He was a soldier in the Corporation War and is more cynical about it than Devlin. Meyer shows how badass he is by fighting and killing off Captain Shannon and fending off Lowe the xenomorph. Unfortunately, we do not get to see that fight with the xenomorph. He also has a big picture attitude to situations, in contrast to Devlin, who looks at the little details.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Devlin is forced to do this. He is being chased by a xenomorph, and he sets a trap in the engine. He lures the xenomorph onto an exposed power cable, only to find out that the xenomorph is too tough to be killed outright by electrocution, and that it was only stunned. So he ends up opening up fuel containers, making a Lampshade Hanging on how unsafe this is, spills liquid gas onto the xenomorph, and runs off, while the xenomorph ends up on fire and explodes. Unfortunately, Devlin finds out shortly afterwards that by doing this, he wrecked up the engines of the space station, and that the station is now in danger of falling into the black hole nearby. Now he has to fix this!
- No Guy Wants an Amazon: Brooks is definitely an amazon. Unfortunately, most of the guys do not want her. She does point out that the resident Jerkass Ward made moves on her, but he got scared off when she wanted to have sex with him on the cold, hard floor.
- Older Hero vs. Younger Villain: Devlin McCormack is the older protagonist and Captain Shannon is the younger antagonist. The antagonist even insults Devlin's age at one point.
- The Reveal: The game has a number of reveals. The first one is that Gates is an undercover agent who has been trying to dig up dirt on the space station and gave Devlin the note about his son's death being murder. The second one is that there are xenomorphs (aliens) running loose, killing off crew members and impersonating them. The third one is that Captain Shannon murdered both Danny and Kaufmann. Why? He killed Danny as revenge for his wife's death, and he killed Kaufmann to frame Devlin. He was also going to kill Devlin. The fourth one is that Mogami-Hudson discovered the xenomorphs in statis in the asteroid and released some of them, hoping to get their technology in return. The fifth one is that Doctor Chu, Waterman, and Lowe are dead and that you were interacting with xenomorphs disguised as them.
- Scary Black Man: Meyer is very much this. He is the engineer of the space station, but do not be fooled! He will cuss and insult you most of the time. He has a problem respecting authority. He also tells Devlin that he was a soldier in the Corporation War, and even as an engineer, he can take care of himself and kick a lot of ass.
- Shoot the Dog: Poor Devlin McCormack has to shoot a number of dogs. First, he has to destroy a ship with Rowland in it. He has to explain to Meyer that the ship contained cocoons that would have hatched into xenomorphs disguised as humans. He could not afford to let such deadly creatures end up on Earth or spreading anywhere else. Also, he points out that the xenomorphs on the ship would have killed Rowland anyway. However, that is nothing compared to what happens later. Ward ends up going berserk, and Devlin finds him in a corridor with Ramen and Brooks. He tried to negotiate with Ward, but Brooks jumps Ward, resulting in the deaths of Ward and Brooks, as well as heavy machinery falling on Ramen, pinning her to the floor. Not only that, but the corridor gets damaged to the point of being in danger of depressurizing shortly. Chandra appears and decides that he loves Ramen enough to stay and die with her. Devlin ends up having to seal off the doors to the corridor on both sides. Yep, four people end up dead... and Devlin feels horrible about it.
- Space Is Noisy: Averted. Every cutscene taking place in space is dead silent. There are people talking in one of these cutscenes, but they are using radio to accomplish this.
- Unequal Pairing: Devlin finds out early on that Captain LaPaz and Lowe (who is on a lower rank than LaPaz) are married. This becomes a plot point later on when Devlin finds out that LaPaz is eight weeks pregnant and has to use this information to blackmail her into giving him the keys to his son Danny's cupboard.
- Ur-Example: This game, released in 1995, is the Ur-Example of the Coming-Out Story in Video Games. There have been reports of games containing LGBT+ dating back to the 1980s, but The Orion Conspiracy is one of the first, if not the first, games to break the gay taboo.
- Vasquez Always Dies: Brooks, who is definitely the Vasquez in this game, gets killed off trying to stop Ward after he has gone berserk. LaPaz, who is easily more feminine compared to Brooks, survives.
