Why is technology so backwards if it's 2557?

[Farquaar]

Give your reasons for why a high-tech science station over 500 years in the future still uses:

• Wood pulp-based paper (We don't have holographic reading devices and whatnot? Who still has filing cabinets in the year 2557?)
  Clunky PDAs straight out of the 1990s
  Syringes (especially since actual hyposprays are probably going to come out in the next decade or two)
  Non-replicated food (They can't make this taste good yet?)
  Unsynthesized meat (Why waste energy on raising animals at all?)
  Invasive surgeries that use 500 year old surgical tools (Especially with respect to appendix removal. You're telling me we don't have a pill for that now?)
  Bulky space suits surplus from the last Apollo mission
  500 year old shotguns (Where's my Mass Effect style infinite ammo?)
  Bulletproof vests that are incredibly bulky but still don't stop bullets (Heck, they don't even bend forks)
  Station hulls that get wrecked by the smallest of explosions (Welder fuel can't melt steel beams)
  No stairs

One could be lazy and say that there was an apocalyptic event in the 2300's that brought humanity back to the Victorian ages, and that people only began rediscovering modern 2019 technologies in the mid 2400s with progress has been steady since then, but I say that's boring. Tell me /tg/station, why would these backwards technologies still be used in the year 2557?

[Super Aggro Crag]

Nanotrasen is a cold and callous corporation. We're lucky they remember to stock the station with oxygen before every shift.

[Anonmare]

Budget cuts

[Davidchan]

2D SPESS

[Tlaltecuhtli]

did you not notice how the pda messages are sent to your mind?

[Nalzul]

spessmans still use floppies, it's like how older movies about spess are

[oranges]

because it's set in the present

[IkeTG]

the year 2557 is actually 2020, they're just using a futuristic calendar that has less days in a year because it's cheaper to print

[SaveVatznick]

It's set in an corporatocratic future. Depending on when the corporations took hold of government in history, said corporations would be able to engineer regulations in a way to prevent new technology and competitions from reaching the mass market by making their competition unable to operate.
Without the threat of new technology usurping their products, the corporations could focus on reducing production costs and creating artificial demand by manufacturing products with extreme planned obsolescency- not in the sense that things go out of date, but that everything is disposable-quality and breaks easily. Basically, imagine if McDonalds ruled the world/space for 300 years. The McChicken wouldn't get any better.

[PKPenguin321]

we have space wizards and youre asking about why there are PDAs?

[BeeSting12]

I'd imagine costs. Definitely cheaper to make a flimsy station than a durable one. PDAs are literally 50 year old technology, probably costs pennies per crew member. My main question is about the single function consoles, a step backward from modern day

[Shadowflame909]

What the fuck happened to phones

[PKPenguin321]

What the fuck happened to phones

real talk tho they didnt exist. the game doesnt share a timeline with irl

[Shadowflame909]

What the fuck happened to phones

real talk tho they didnt exist. the game doesnt share a timeline with irl

You right


A shapeshifting Twitch Streamer would make a lot of money


Maybe they'd be doing a Changeling Stunts IRL challenge

[SpaceManiac]

What the fuck happened to phones

real talk tho they didnt exist. the game doesnt share a timeline with irl

[Mickyan]

Sci-fi tropes give a skewed view of what technological advancement looks like, that's why there's so many illustrations and movies that show how in the year 2000 there would be flying cars and laser guns. Paper's been around for millennia and that's not going to change anytime soon even though we already have tablets.

Also it's 2019 and some people are still using faxes

[confused rock]

Emp tho

[PKPenguin321]

What the fuck happened to phones

real talk tho they didnt exist. the game doesnt share a timeline with irl

Cell phones i mean

[obscolene]

What the fuck happened to phones

real talk tho they didnt exist. the game doesnt share a timeline with irl

Cell phones i mean

that's just because nobody has coded them yet.

[MGP]

For some, balance. For others, lack of coders who care about immersion and roleplaying. The "budget cuts" meme makes no sense. Nanotrasen and the Syndicate are in a hyper competitive environment, a state of protracted total war. Cutting the budget to your ultra secret research station under such circumstances is frankly, fucking retarded. Imagine the USA giving Project Manhattan a measly one hundred thousand dollars for a real world equivalent. No mega corp with its own existence on the line could possibly be so incompetent to skimp on costs associated with projects like SS13, otherwise their destruction would have occurred ages ago. Similarly the idea that there is some sort of monopoly that makes innovation impossible is also wrong. For one there isn't even a monopoly, there are multiple other factions that are competing with NT at any given time. Most obviously the Syndicate, but there are also the Space Wizards, Space Ninjas, Cultists, etc. Then you consider that apparently these organizations have entirely different economic models than NT (I point to the Derelict as proof of this) and you realize that Vatznick's argument makes no sense at all. So yeah. No. There is no good IC reason for stupid anachronisms.

A few of those things could and should be changed without messing with the balance too much. PDA's could be replaced with cell phones without messing with things too much. It shouldn't be too hard to code. Just set up a private channel on a vacant frequency for the duration of the phone call. Phone in hand to use and if it's dropped the call ends. Various "apps" for other functionality.

[PKPenguin321]

For some, balance. For others, lack of coders who care about immersion and roleplaying. The "budget cuts" meme makes no sense. Nanotrasen and the Syndicate are in a hyper competitive environment, a state of protracted total war. Cutting the budget to your ultra secret research station under such circumstances is frankly, fucking retarded. Imagine the USA giving Project Manhattan a measly one hundred thousand dollars for a real world equivalent. No mega corp with its own existence on the line could possibly be so incompetent to skimp on costs associated with projects like SS13, otherwise their destruction would have occurred ages ago. Similarly the idea that there is some sort of monopoly that makes innovation impossible is also wrong. For one there isn't even a monopoly, there are multiple other factions that are competing with NT at any given time. Most obviously the Syndicate, but there are also the Space Wizards, Space Ninjas, Cultists, etc. Then you consider that apparently these organizations have entirely different economic models than NT (I point to the Derelict as proof of this) and you realize that Vatznick's argument makes no sense at all. So yeah. No. There is no good IC reason for stupid anachronisms.

A few of those things could and should be changed without messing with the balance too much. PDA's could be replaced with cell phones without messing with things too much. It shouldn't be too hard to code. Just set up a private channel on a vacant frequency for the duration of the phone call. Phone in hand to use and if it's dropped the call ends. Various "apps" for other functionality.

just puked in my mouth, newfriends need to be killed

[BeeSting12]

What the fuck happened to phones

real talk tho they didnt exist. the game doesnt share a timeline with irl

Cell phones i mean

what tower do you think the cell phones are gonna bounce off of?

radios are more practical on a space station, and if you need to talk directly to someone then theres always PDAs or holocalls

[IkeTG]

For some, balance. For others, lack of coders who care about immersion and roleplaying. The "budget cuts" meme makes no sense. Nanotrasen and the Syndicate are in a hyper competitive environment, a state of protracted total war. Cutting the budget to your ultra secret research station under such circumstances is frankly, fucking retarded. Imagine the USA giving Project Manhattan a measly one hundred thousand dollars for a real world equivalent. No mega corp with its own existence on the line could possibly be so incompetent to skimp on costs associated with projects like SS13, otherwise their destruction would have occurred ages ago. Similarly the idea that there is some sort of monopoly that makes innovation impossible is also wrong. For one there isn't even a monopoly, there are multiple other factions that are competing with NT at any given time. Most obviously the Syndicate, but there are also the Space Wizards, Space Ninjas, Cultists, etc. Then you consider that apparently these organizations have entirely different economic models than NT (I point to the Derelict as proof of this) and you realize that Vatznick's argument makes no sense at all. So yeah. No. There is no good IC reason for stupid anachronisms.

A few of those things could and should be changed without messing with the balance too much. PDA's could be replaced with cell phones without messing with things too much. It shouldn't be too hard to code. Just set up a private channel on a vacant frequency for the duration of the phone call. Phone in hand to use and if it's dropped the call ends. Various "apps" for other functionality.

Imagine missing the point this comically hard

[Mickyan]

Also one pet peeve I have about overused sci-fi tropes: spacesuits are so bulky for very important reasons as they need many layers of materials to protect against the many dangers of space: pressure, temperature (once you can insulate enough against the cold of space you also need to make sure the person inside doesn't overheat), debris, radiation. You also need life support, ventilation, communication equipment and all that jazz.

Same applies to body armor, if you want to stop stronger bullets you need more bulk.

You can throw out all realism and creativity and just go with MAGIC SPACE MATERIALS THAT JUST WORK but that's stupid and lazy

[Super Aggro Crag]

I get it mickyan but i also wish we had skintight retro 50s pulp scifi sexy spacesuits with bubble helmets and thigh high spaceboots

[Shadowflame909]

what tower do you think the cell phones are gonna bounce off of?

The same one centcomm uses to talk into our headsets across the z-levels


Also sattelites

[confused rock]

Lifeweb has fucking rotary phones and they are HELL to use, and to find people's number. never add phones, ever. station bounced radios are phone enough.

[Farquaar]

I just realized
Spacemen don’t build stairs because they can’t bend their legs
They just slide around on their feet at high speeds, likely using flatulence as propulsion

[MGP]

Also one pet peeve I have about overused sci-fi tropes: spacesuits are so bulky for very important reasons as they need many layers of materials to protect against the many dangers of space: pressure, temperature (once you can insulate enough against the cold of space you also need to make sure the person inside doesn't overheat), debris, radiation. You also need life support, ventilation, communication equipment and all that jazz.

Same applies to body armor, if you want to stop stronger bullets you need more bulk.

You can throw out all realism and creativity and just go with MAGIC SPACE MATERIALS THAT JUST WORK but that's stupid and lazy

Shh.

https://everydayastronaut.com/up-close- ... pace-suit/

Imagine missing the point this comically hard

I am autistic and that post seemed more interesting to make then to construct some retarded loopy IC explanation for the coders lack of care about RP.

[Mickyan]

Shh.

https://everydayastronaut.com/up-close- ... pace-suit/

This is not an EVA suit. It's for use inside a spacecraft.

[nullbear]

SS13 is part of the retrofi genre. It's scifi as envisioned in the early 1900's. Most of ss13's references are to scifi movies of the 1950's - 1990's, when phones werent popular, crt's were, and pda's were the height of portable computing. This isn't a new thing, and its popular in newer AAA games as well. A core part of the genre is analogue computers, as opposed to digital.

The opposite end would be cyberpunk, where digital technology is more popular than analog, and there is a focus on advanced/integrated tech.

where: retrofi captures the feeling of old scifi/horror much better, and the limitations of the technology make it more intimate and urgent,
cyberpunk captures the feeling of newer scifi/adventure, and the 'ease' of the technology makes it more relaxed and integrated.

typically more thought and effort goes into retrofi and work goes into planning how technology actually WORKS, where a LOT of cyberpunk is "i dont know how it works, it just does. Like an app on your phone." and comes off as more "sci-fantasy".

It's the difference between having to manually calculate and program nav coordinates into an autopilot, and saying "siri, drive to work." in your self-driving-car. Or the difference between having to jury-rig your power supply to route your dwindling energy reserves to shields, versus pressing a button and shouting "route all remaining power to shields!"

[PKPenguin321]

SS13 is part of the retrofi genre. It's scifi as envisioned in the early 1900's. Most of ss13's references are to scifi movies of the 1950's - 1990's, when phones werent popular, crt's were, and pda's were the height of portable computing. This isn't a new thing, and its popular in newer AAA games as well. A core part of the genre is analogue computers, as opposed to digital.

The opposite end would be cyberpunk, where digital technology is more popular than analog, and there is a focus on advanced/integrated tech.

where: retrofi captures the feeling of old scifi/horror much better, and the limitations of the technology make it more intimate and urgent,
cyberpunk captures the feeling of newer scifi/adventure, and the 'ease' of the technology makes it more relaxed and integrated.

typically more thought and effort goes into retrofi and work goes into planning how technology actually WORKS, where a LOT of cyberpunk is "i dont know how it works, it just does. Like an app on your phone." and comes off as more "sci-fantasy".

It's the difference between having to manually calculate and program nav coordinates into an autopilot, and saying "siri, drive to work." in your self-driving-car. Or the difference between having to jury-rig your power supply to route your dwindling energy reserves to shields, versus pressing a button and shouting "route all remaining power to shields!"

huge ups to this, this is definitely why. the whole retrofi (or retro-future or whatever you want to call it) is largely the aesthetic of the game

[Shadowflame909]

ok then
How do we have artifical Intelligence with no satellite
where is this wee-fi coming from!?!

[confused rock]

I just realized
Spacemen don’t build stairs because they can’t bend their legs
They just slide around on their feet at high speeds, likely using flatulence as propulsion

I liked this until the final sentence fragment

[Mickyan]

I think the greatest example of retrofi in recent memory is Alien: Isolation, everything looks like it's slightly outdated but functional and cost efficient

[Farquaar]

I just realized
Spacemen don’t build stairs because they can’t bend their legs
They just slide around on their feet at high speeds, likely using flatulence as propulsion

I liked this until the final sentence fragment

Hey, don't shoot the messenger. Just think of your average shift on Goonstation.

[nullbear]

Another decent retrofi example is "Event[0]"
Edit: "Soma", "Bioshock", "Fallout", and "Sealab 2020" also come to mind. Though Sealab 2020 is set in next year so... (Hey im sure it was considered far future when it was released)

[WarbossLincoln]

500 year old shotguns (Where's my Mass Effect style infinite ammo?)

Actually like 700 year old shotguns.

Anywho, as to why are they still using gunpowder, it's cause chemical propellants are pretty efficient when it comes to firearms. It's entirely possible that by 2550s we haven't developed an energy weapon that's remotely as efficient as gunpowder. In the game you a handful of shots out of an energy weapon before a lengthy recharge. Lengthy compared to swapping a mag.

The real question is why would they have a shotgun at all, esp a pump shotgun. They're neat but shotguns aren't super reliable, even a pump is easy to foul up and jam if you're trying to shoot under pressure. Today in 2019 they aren't even that cheap unless you get a crappy shotgun. A mossberg 500 is kind of the standard, good pump action and it's like 300$. You can get an AR15 for like 350-400$ these days if you catch a good sale. There's not a lot of reason to pick a shotgun over a rifle(unless you just prefer a shotgun over a rifle, then more power to you). The price difference isn't even enough if you're a super cheap space mega corp. Armory needs to be stocked with disablers and 556 rifles.

[cacogen]

1. It's retro-futuristic
2. The date is completely arbitrary

Spoiler:

Way back when the date was added to the PDA there were like four different in-game years used across the various computers (e.g. mech logs) and to introduce consistency the one set 540 years in the future was picked because it was the latest (and therefore the existence of the more magical technology was more plausible). It (probably, given some of the stuff is deliberately retro) should've been an earlier date than what it is, and absolutely anyone could change it which would probably cause a furore even though to my knowledge it's completely cosmetic.

[datorangebottle]

I get it mickyan but i also wish we had skintight retro 50s pulp scifi sexy spacesuits with bubble helmets and thigh high spaceboots

We pretty much do have thigh-high spaceboots. Sexy sexy orange magboots. Those things are fucking thicc.

[iksyp]

For some, balance. For others, lack of coders who care about immersion and roleplaying. The "budget cuts" meme makes no sense. Nanotrasen and the Syndicate are in a hyper competitive environment, a state of protracted total war. Cutting the budget to your ultra secret research station under such circumstances is frankly, fucking retarded.

you're implying that ss13 isn't purposefully a metal death trap and isn't purposefully advertised as a top research station to draw heat away from everything else
why would they hire literal psychopaths or incompetent people to do their job on their station

[Bawhoppennn]

I've always liked the idea of a Space Dark Ages.

[nullbear]

Necro. I'm bored.

PDA's are cheap to make. Phone's would be fkn useless in space without a proper satellite network, the PDA's are designed to operate on a 'station intranet' hosted by the company, and do quite well at that. This, paired with Stationwide Radio/Intercom, further makes phones redundant. PDA lets you transmit text-messages, like emails, on the station intranet, pointless OOC considering radios and PDA's both technically send "text", but IC'ly, it would be similar to sending a departmental email. Now, the big reason i think PDA's would be going strong, is their moddability (on top of their durable/ruggedness, and infinite battery-life). The PDA's appear to be designed similarly to an old-gameboy color, with a slot for a cartridge (or two) that can be used to vastly expand the functionality of the device in ways a phone might not be able to. Sure, apps exist for phones. But PDA cartridges can scan reagents and detect air pressure. What's to say you couldn't get a PDA cartridge that also functions as a stungun, or as a breathalyzer? I'm sure phone's could/would exist in the SS13 setting on Earth, or more globalized communities, but in a tight-knit corporatized space, a secure corporate intranet wins over a global and open internet.

Syringes are cheaper and easier to manufacture, and can be used for more than just flesh. What's REALLY weird is that they're not single-use syringes. Fkn nasty. THAT is budget cuts and safety oversights.

Replicated and Synthesized meat exist and are quite prevalent, but they just don't quite 'hit' the same. For some people, it might literally just be about pride for 'the old world', and 'real' meat. Hell, we have those today, even, with all these people hating on vegan meat substitutes just because. This is in the same vein as 500 year old shotguns. "Muh collector's item."
I DO have a collection of various e-weaponry sprited though, if anyone wants to code it.

We have stairs. They just suck. It looks like stairs don't do well in zero-G IRL either.

On station hulls, I've personally theorized that most stuff in space would be manufactured from ceramic composites rather than steel. It's typically lighter and harder, not to mention much more available. Silicon Nitride comes to mind. (Asteroid + Gas Giant Scooping + Solar Panels = Hardened Plates that can be spark sintered in a vacuum without gas welders) Ceramic is hard, but would tend to 'shatter' rather than dent or bend.

Budget cuts, and space-gear. Simpler equipment that can be 'printed' on-site with an autolathe would be preferred over complex equipment. Simpler equipment with less materials and moving parts would be easier to recycle on-site, and easier to replace if it were damaged, as opposed to something that might require a full manufacturing plant to produce, before being shipped in specially.

Finally, it's to fit in with the whole retro-scifi-horror aesthetic that SS13 clings to.

[oranges]

you could have just said the bottom sentence

[Tlaltecuhtli]

its a simple marketing tecnique, why sell high tech shit when you can slowly sell things with yearly small changes releases (like apple and i phones)?

[cacogen]

just easier to add content and art based on existing technology and that date wasn't picked until way later

[Flatulent]

2557 is in Islamic calendar and that leaves some “uh oh” implications considering state of technology and lack of presence of some particular items we use irl

ever wondered why is there no pork in ss13? now you know.

[Armhulen]

It's actually 2560.

[pugie]

We do actually have phones but the only contact on them is the Bogdanoffs.

[oranges]

why is space cold