I’d call it a ‘simple question’, but considering that I’ve been around half a decade myself: it’ll probably be a bit of a longer story for most folks.
The brief version is that I started around late 2019 in college. I’d picked-up SS13 in highschool but didn’t get into CM until after graduation and a break-up. Squads still had decently-strong identities, Ice was Nice, and doctors were still making ‘Quick Fix’ since Unga Juice wasn’t a thing yet.
I played the shit out of CM for a good couple of years and I’d like to think that I enjoyed more than half of my time each round, but really I think I just enjoyed busy-work and roleplay and just zoned out for the rest of the time.
Chemline, try to start a conversation, tab-out until it’s time for surgery.
Patrol squad prep, arrest the inevitable Delta trying to kill/break something, deal with the resulting riot, tab-out when the prisoner alt-tabs for precisely the length of their sentence.
Grab my mats, go down to the planet, build a cade, tab-out when my whole squad abandons me and a lurker comes through gap.
Log into a console, try to guide the squad, sit-back when nobody listens to directions but still need to be attentive enough to launch pods and switch the aSL.
I started to peter-off a bit in late 2020-2021 as I picked-up a job where I worked weekends and into the night meaning that when I did have time to play pop was pretty low. On top of that, I got a long-term girlfriend who was also a gamer, and we spent a lot of time playing co-op games like Risk of Rain or EDF over SS13.
The final nail in the coffin was that I moved-on from the Laptop I started SS13 on and the Desktop I picked-up from an office liquidation sale to one I custom-built, and had a lot more luck with finding games that appealed to certain things I wanted from CM but couldn’t quite scratch the itch of: Rimworld is Command except the crew listens to you, Darktide or Helldivers is Rifleman and Spec except you stand a chance when outnumbered and your weapons have impact, and a few games like Risk of Rain or Caves of Qud amongst certain mods could even scratch the Xeno itch.
With a second monitor, I could have a ton of fun socializing with other groups about writing, fiction, and special interests while playing singleplayer games, and it became a lot easier to contribute and make new friends (especially when their opinions weren’t formed on you during highschool).
I’ve still got a soft-spot for CM, just not one that I can reliably find time for. How about you?
Started in 2016 after I got bored of Goonstation and wanted to try out the weird funky server that had whored the #1 spot on the hub for literal months. Was pretty intrigued and played a lot as a mostly mute gasmask wearer (though to be fair, I wore it not because I was a warhammer LARPer like PVTs today, I wore it because if I didn’t I’d fucking die in the catastrophic atmospheric decompressions that happened every round shipside & on the Rasputin. But yes, the gasmasks back then looked like the ones the RDA SecOps marines wore in James Cameron’s Avatar, and I fucking loved the aesthetic. I will never forgive the bastard who changed the sprite to whatever abomination it is now). Played a significant amount of xenomorph, mostly as Boiler & Praetorian because lag in 2016 was hell on earth.
I’d later go on extended hiatus, playing CM on and off. I’d eventually graduate to maining engineer & medic, but never grew confident enough to play specialist or SL. After a point (I have no idea when, exactly), I played my first round of SG and was hooked- I no longer felt like I was just sitting around doing mostly nothing (fearRP is real), I felt as if I was contributing to every single firefight in a positive way. I’d gotten more talkative, but I played irregularly, so I never made any solid connections with other players- I mostly just recognised names I saw over and over.
By the time of the playtime wipe, I had basically totally transitioned out of RFN-Xeno gameplay, and pretty much only played SG.
I only started playing CM actively on a regular basis recently within the span of the last few years, and I’ve gotten more integrated with the community since I began playing consistently again. It’s been strange having almost everyone you knew in the past just… not exist in contemporary CM, albeit there’s a handful of degenerates who I swear never stopped playing.
I’m still a filthy SG main and it’ll probably stay that way until the heat death of the universe, but I’ve gotten solid experience in other roles like SL now (albeit I will probably never get significant practical specialist experience since it would mean sacrificing SG rolls), and it’s nice to have cool faces I recognise and actually interact with nowadays, as compared to my gasmask PFC era. I keep thinking I should go back and start playing ranged xeno castes again, but honestly I’m scared of being dead weight, especially since the pressure on each player in xeno is so much more intense than as a marine.
Was playing barotrauma open alpha (beta?), the desc said something along the lines of “Spiritual successor to SS13”. Decided to look up SS13, watched the MandaloreGaming review. Downloaded Byond, made my account in 2018.
Hopped on paradise, walked around, punched myself a few times, left. Roughly 6 days after making my account, I hopped onto CM and got my first 2 notes.
After bouncing around a few servers, I joined Yogstation and learned how to play SS13 there. After playing yogs and feeling like I actually knew how to do most jobs ‘okayish’ I ended up playing TG for a few thousand hours.
Fast forward to around 2021, I decide “Hey, I should go play CM again” and appealed my ban, decided to play as xeno and mained sentinel (pre rework base strain) and warrior (and also surv, though I wasn’t too robust). Back in 2021 double-shotgun was meta so maining sentinel on the backline allowed me to easily cap these double-shotgun wielding marines (because sentinel was a caste that could actually function back then).
In 2022 GoldenDarkness reworked sentinel into it’s current state (and the only buff since then has been that sentinel can now 1tap survs) so I decided to return to TGstation for a few years.
Roughly a year and a half later I returned to CM and now I play researcher/RFN/Surv/IO and drone/runner.
Maybe one day sentinel will be re-buffed (5 sentinel buff/new strain PRs were opened, and none were mergedm). (and the newest one is by goldendarkness, maybe it’ll get merged??) (please sentinel has been the worst T1 caste since 2022).
started playing 12 years ago, bounced from most generic station-based servers for a while but on infrequently; i’d play ss13 like maybe three times a month, stayed away from CM for a long time because i disliked certain mechanical things and dont like alien in general. did a short stint on shiptest, a few years on TGMC, and then finally got dragged over here by a whole group of people.
everything basilherb said; SG was my most-played groundside role on TGMC too. love dakka.
had a lot of fun with this game over the years but none of the RP goes like it did a decade ago. part of that was the server pops were smaller and whatever too, so that kind of helped. i still remember my first antag round where i threw my PDA in disposals to ditch it after i used it for Evil, and a really really nice doctor moth found it and came all the way around the station to find me and go “i was so worried about you, i thought something really bad happened to you!”. i remember botanymaxxing on TG. good tiiiiiiimes.
I dabbled on goon and /vg/ around 2011. Went hard as engineer main on /tg/ from 2017 to 2020. Gameplay changes made it unfun enough to quit. Started CM in 2022 and never looked back.
My friend got me to get BYOND to play this game and taught me I think last year? Could be some time in 2022 as well however. Getting more back into it recently, still feel incompetent but a bit less so than I was when I started playing lol, started throwing myself into SO/ASO positions recently been pretty fun.
Yo spit that shit. The integrated gasmask is slightly less ugly, but that old avatar gasmask was fuckin slick. Lotta sprite updates I’m cool with, but that was absolutely a fuckin miss right there
