Star Pirates

Star Pirates is a Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game created by Snakehead Games. The game is set in space in a not so distant future where Earth had been destroyed in what is known as "The Starcrash" and Humankind has taken to live among the planets and asteroids of the Solar System.

Post-Starcrash, players find themselves labelled as "pirates", forced to eke out a living as best they can in a Crapsack World. Players travel between planets (Mars through the binary Pluto & Charon), and have the option of delving into the asteroid belts and the oort cloud beyond the solar system to earn extra money. Pirates are often encouraged to attack and raid other pirates to gain levels and earn more cargo. Debris searching nets players items, which can be used to boost stats (Weapons, Engines, and Shields) so that they can take down other players.

''Do not add tropes that apply to Role Play threads from the forums or elsewhere. This page is specifically about the game itself.''


 * There's either an Absurdly High Level Cap or it's an Endless Game.
 * Action Bar: basically the entirety of game is played through this, as the graphics are extremely minimal.
 * AI Is a Crapshoot: applies somewhat to the AI Council of the back story. Your Mileage May Vary.
 * Alcoholic Boost: the alcohol-based items in the game boost the engine stat.
 * An Entrepreneur Is You: Some players do this with unwanted items. Inverted by warpedboard, who gives a particular item away for free, and then pays players who give them back to him.
 * Big Freaking Gun: a number of the game's higher-rarity weapons, like the Mauler Array, falls into this catagory.
 * Bribing Your Way to Victory: the higher-level players, powerlevellers, and a large chunk of the playerbase do this. It's called "Notorious Pirate" days for a monthly benefit package, you can purchase Points (which make the game easier and/or quicker in a lot of ways), and you can purchase [AICBs], which are used to research stats faster. But in theory, you don't need to pay money at all--it's very possible to play the entire game without paying a cent of RL money.
 * Crapsack World: what Earth was before The End of the World as We Know It. And what the solar system is after that.
 * Digital Avatar
 * Duct Tape for Everything: you're supposed to be using it to repair your starship...
 * Fridge Logic??
 * Earth-That-Was
 * The End of the World as We Know It: already happened.
 * Gaming Clan: a major part of the game. Called "Fleets" in the game, they serve the same purpose as a clan.
 * The Great Player-Versus-Player Debate: happens with some frequency.
 * Government Conspiracy: a common thought by players about a shadowy ruling force within the game world known as the AI Council.
 * Informed Equipment: all of Star Pirates equipment and items. You can see the bonuses the items give, and you can see which items you have installed, but they do not affect the image of your ship at all.
 * Item Upgrading: collect a certain amount of the parts in order to upgrade the item using Duct Tape and in-game money.
 * Level Editor: The player-created Missions which become available at level 25.
 * Level Grinding: but only if the player actually cares for that sort of thing. You don't even need to do it in order to enjoy the game fully.
 * Life Meter
 * Lonely At the Top: may be a condition afflicting players in the top 5 of the Hall of Fame rankings.
 * Metagame: lots of it.
 * Money Sink: otherwise known as the gambling games, and a tax levied on items and raids.
 * My Rules Are Not Your Rules: the NPCs embody this. Some players even Lampshade the fact by bitterly asking why everyone can't have the same toys the NPCs do.
 * One-Hit Kill: what a number of players aim for in Player Versus Player battles.
 * Pirate Booty: Lampshaded by nearly every player.
 * Player Versus Player: What the most of the game is about!
 * Random Event: Things like Sunspots, Gremlins, Hallowed Echoes of the Mighty Heroes, and other such events that effect everyone in the game. Can also be extended to include things like freebies given out game-wide by the admins.
 * Rubber Band AI: The NPCs, quite naturally.
 * Space Pirates: Well...duh!
 * Space Police: Given shape by the unnamed secutiry vessels that have a chance of interception if an attack is made on an online player.
 * That One Boss: The Sentient Moons, to most players. No matter the strength of the player, there's always an NPC who can take him/her out.
 * The AI Advice is a lying bastard
 * The Tetris Effect: just ask someone who's been playing for a while. ThisTroper has been known to dream in Star Pirates.
 * Ultimate Gamer 386: A Real Life example in the form of Mr. Awesome; see that page for details.
 * Vendor Trash: Subverted the in-game item known as a krambuck. Not only is the item useless, but you can't even sell it for significant amounts of in-game cash.
 * Wave Motion Gun: often paired with the BFG. The Black Hole Generator may fall into this.
 * Web Comics: A lot of webcomics are represented in the game through comic-themed fleets... and rumors had it that a lot of the NPC's met in the games' Deep Belt and Asteroid Belt, can be attested to said webcomics too.
 * Web Games
 * Who Wants to Live Forever?: The regenabots, the in-game Healing Factor, basically cause this, along with a nice helping of Immortality Begins At Twenty (or so). The actual age tends to depend on the individual player and how they've decided their character backstory.
 * Yet Another Stupid Death: what happens when players forget they were in research mode and try to attack another player or an NPC.