Universal Ammunition: Difference between revisions

See also [[Bottomless Magazines]], [[One Bullet Clips]].

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* ''[[GoldenEye 007 (1997 video game)|Golden Eye 1997]]'' has two main types of ammo, pistol and rifle. No matter what pistol or submachine gun you use, it'll take the same ammo. Likewise, no matter what rifle you pick up, it'll take whatever rifle ammo you have. However, there are unique types of ammunition specific to certain weapons such as rocket ammunition for the rocket launcher or shotgun shells for the shotgun.

** ''[[Medal of Honor]]: Allied Assault'' is in the same boat, with wildly different guns from four nations all accepting the same carts and mags if they're the same "type" (pistol, rifle, etc.).

* ''[[PowerSlave|Exhumed]]'' (a.k.a. ''[[Marked Based Title|Powerslave]]'') has a variation in the [[Sega Saturn]] and [[PlayStation]] versions in which the ammo pickups are all generic blue orbs that refill whatever weapon you are holding at the time, but the weapons themselves all have different ammo pools beyond that.

 

 

* In ''[[Star Ruler]]'', all ships draw from an abstracted ammo supply with no attempt to distinguish types. Given that you can have any number of ships in varying sizes from fighters to planet-sized ([[Serial Escalation|or bigger!]]) super-battleships, trying to manage individual ammo types would be a real pain in the arse anyway.

 

* In ''[[Xenogears]]'', you have to buy ammo for [[The Gunslinger]] Billy, but you don't need to change this if you equip a new gun for him.

* Irvine in ''[[Final Fantasy VIII]]'' has ammo for his [[Limit Break]], but these work for all the guns he can equip in the game.

* All weapons in ''[[Fallout]]'' that use the same caliber take the same ammunition. The issue of different cartridges in the same caliber is ignored, magazines/clips/belt links don't need to be kept track of, and characters seem to load mags in the heat of combat.

** Possibly justified by the fact in a world with definitely limited ammunition guns would be modified to accept the most common types.

** Due to a [[Good Bad Bugs|bug]] in ''[[Fallout 2]]'', the P90 [[Expy]] gun was originally loaded with 9mm ammo, which was extremely rare and only (designed) to be used in this one gun (it wasn't even the only specialized 9mm ammo, either - elsewhere in the game is a Mauser that takes 9mm (ball) ammo). However, once emptied, it then took extremely common 10mm ammo.

** In ''[[Fallout 3]]'', the .32 Caliber pistol and Hunting Rifle both use .32 caliber ammo, however the rifle is much more powerful than the pistol. The pistol is probably the weakest weapon in the game.

* Heavily averted in ''7.62mm High Caliber'', with each gun taking the proper caliber and many calibers coming in multiple brands and types that can be mixed and matched in the magazines, and each gun takes its own magazine. One error is that the Mauser pistol and carbine take Tokarev ammo (which will load in a Mauser but are too powerful to safely use, and require 7.63mm Mauser ammunition instead).

 

* Heavily, ''painfully'' averted in ''[[Operation Flashpoint]]'' and its [[Spiritual Successor]] ''[[Arm A]]''. Unless the type of ammunition is used in a whole closely related family/series of firearms, you'll have to find appropriate ammo for each gun. You won't have much luck firing an AK-74 with a magazine of M16 bullets. As noted, however, related firearms can take the same ammo (most assault rifles of Western origin in the series use the same magazines as the M16, for example).

 

* ''[[Resident Evil 4]]''. The ''Broken Butterfly'' is a revolver, whereas the ''[[Killer7]]'' takes magazines, which both use the same ammo. The ammo for the more basic handguns changes color to match the gun it's being loaded into.

** Furthermore, the magazines are the same size for each gun, but the ammo cap for each gun can be upgraded. Is Leon putting two mags in on top of each other?

** Averted in ''[[Parasite Eve 2]]'', each ammo type is [[Color Coded for Your Convenience]] - this even gets lampshaded by one of the NPCs, who notes that another character jammed a pistol by trying to force the ammo from a different pistol caliber into it.

 

* In ''[[Dark Sector]]'' this is played pretty much straight with everything but the starting pistol; the Klin PP9 (9mm PMM), AKS-74U (5.45x39mm) and G36C (5.56x45mm) all share an ammo pool, as do the Webley Mark IV revolver (really a .38, but supposed to be a Nagant, firing 7.62x38mm rimmed) and the SOCOM 16 rifle (firing 7.62x51mm NATO).

* Averted in ''[[Max Payne (series)|Max Payne]]'', where the only weapons that share ammo are the two 12 gauge shotguns. Every other ammo type is identified by the weapon it matches.

 

* In ''[[Jagged Alliance]] 2'' all 7.62mm calibre weapons of WarPac/ChiCom origin use the same ammunition - 7.62mm, which would be logical, except there are three kinds of 7.62mm Warsaw Pact ammunition in real life: 7.62x54mmR, as used by the Dragunov and most of their MGs, 7.62x39mm as used by the AK47 / AKM and their relatives and 7.62x25 used by the PPSh/Type 65 and other pistol type weapons. They are definitely NOT interchangeable. This was eventually fixed in the v1.13 modification.

 

** Averted in the first game, and wasn't an issue because ammo was stored in a [[Hyperspace Arsenal]] separate from the normal [[Grid Inventory]]. That said, pistol and sniper ammo were simply cartons of loose bullets rather than magazines. That's [[One Bullet Clips]] for you.

** ''[[Deus Ex: Human Revolution|Human Revolution]]'' averts this even further, as ammunition takes up inventory space and almost every weapon requires specific ammunition; only very similar weapons like the regular and double-barrel shotgun or regular and silenced sniper rifle use the same ammo. [[One Bullet Clips]] are still present.

* [[Return to Castle Wolfenstein]] uses this in two ways, first for the MP40 and Sten both using the 9mm Parabellum rounds (the British designed the Sten specifically to use German ammunition for work behind the lines) along with the M1911 Colt pistol and Thomson both using .45 rounds. The other guns, however, each have their own ammunition.

 

* ''[[Metroid]] Prime Hunters'' have actual nanotech-based Universal Ammo that fits all of your special weapons. Only the missile launcher uses different ammo. Since all the guns are at least partially energy weapons, it's a bit more believable, though, as the ammo itself probably doesn't need to shape itself to extreme tolerances - even for the explosive Battlehammer, "close enough" will do, allowing a quick configuration to be at least somewhat plausible.

 

* ''[[Mass Effect]]'' also takes this to the extreme. Ammunition in the game is nothing more than a metal block that gets shaved into the proper form. However, unlike above where it's crippling, this game has as-good-as-unlimited ammo, with rate of fire being limited by the weapon's heat sink. The block in a standard assault rifle is about 5,000 shots, which is more than enough to fight a war, and with field tools a new block can be swapped into place in a matter of minutes. In Wrex's back story, he once fought a duel that lasted for a number of days. He ran out of ammo and had to take a gun from a merc he'd killed in the process.

** ''[[Mass Effect 2]]'' kept the unlimited ammunition, but added "thermal clips" that absorb heat from the weapon and eventually need to be discarded. Essentially, they act just like ammunition. The clips are universal - pick one up and it adds more total shots to all of your weapons. However, the game does feature a more straight example of the trope with the Heavy Weapons, which do use traditional ammo... the same ammo, whether the weapon is a rocket launcher, an experimental BFG, or an ''alien energy weapon built from technology beyond what anyone else has''. That this "ammo" is actually a high-density power cell doesn't explain either its universal compatibility or the weapons' ability to form complicated projectiles from that raw energy - though it may be that, like standard mass effect weapons, at least the second point is rendered moot by the weapon typically having more than enough ammunition to go through a full load of energy dozens of times, and being serviced on return to the ''Normandy''. Also, Shepard can run out of thermal clips for one weapon, yet still have plenty of shots left in the others, which is inconsistent with said ammunition being universal.

 

* This was earlier implemented to much less outrage upon reception in ''[[Oni]]''. ''Oni'' has two kinds of ammunition: Kinetic, which supposedly consisted of explosives/propellant and slugs, usable for everything from SMGs to rocket launchers, which configured them appropriately on loading; and energy, which was for things like typical plasma blasters and tasers. The bigger the gun, the fewer shots any given ammo will provide before being used up.

 

** However, the AK-47 and M4 both share ammo.

 

* Most [[Frickin' Laser Beams|blasters]] in the ''[[Star Wars]]'' universe use a substance called Tibanna Gas and Power Packs. Apparently power packs come in a universal format too.

** ''[[Knights of the Old Republic|KoTOR 2]]'' had you run a across a [[Proud Warrior Race Guy]] who was hiding from some predators. If you choose to mock him for managing to run out of ammo, he will ask if you have ''ever'' emptied a blaster and needed to reload.

** The ''[[Dark Forces Saga]]'' had one type of blaster ammo in the first game, and two in later games, both of which could be recharged from the same power stations.

 

* Similar to the ''Invisible War'' example in above, in John Scalzi's ''[[Old Man's War]]'', the rifles used by the Colonial forces use nanotechnology-based ammo that reconfigures itself into whatever you're asking for—including rockets, grenades, bullets, and ''microwaves''. You can even create your own custom firing macros (eg., fire a grenade followed by a blast of flame for good measure)

 

* Humorously averted in a scene in ''[[Burn Notice]]'' where Sam is needling Michael about having no life outside the spy business. Sam offhandedly mentions that his girlfriend Veronica once asked him if bullets came in different sizes.

* Being forensics shows, ''[[CSI]]'' and its spin-offs and bandwagon-jumpers routinely avert the trope. In a notable recent example on ''CSI'', the very fact that the rounds used in the crime were of an unusual caliber and design was a plot point. The rounds aren't even commercially available in the States. Turned out they came from {{spoiler|a batch of FN P90s stolen from US forces in Pakistan}}.

* [[Dark Comedy|Humorously]] averted in ''[[Series/Shameless|Shameless]]'' (US). Frank gets hold of an old WWII Luger and wants to shoot it in order to scare his girlfriend. However, there is no ammunition for the gun so he just grabs some random bullets that fit into the gun. When he tries to fire it, the gun blows up in his hand.

 

* The tabletop RPG ''[[Shadowrun]]'' suggests handling ammo this way: all weapons of the same class use the same ammo, for simplicity.

** Then again, its Sega Genesis game fits the above Inexplicable Example table, as Ares Universal clips not only fit any gun they're loaded into (regardless of class), but ''round themselves off'' to maintain a roughly equal percentage of ammo remaining across unequal magazine sizes.

* Painfully averted in ''[[GURPS]]: High Tech'' which gives an exhaustive list of ammunition types. Played more straight in ''Ultra-Tech'' where there are only a dozen different rounds between all the guns.

* An odd version in the ''Wasteland'' RPG. Ammo calibers were standardized (.45, 9mm, 7.62x39mm, and energy), but the clips themselves were 'universal'--a rifle ammo clip could fit in any rifle. Their capacity was determined only by the weapon they were loaded in: the same clip that put 7 rounds in a .45 pistol gave 30 to a submachine gun.

 

* [[Nerf Brand|Nerf darts]] ''do'' fit with the majority of Nerf guns, it's when you have a non-Nerf brand gun that you run into problems...

** Of course, darts come in a variety of diameters, which obviously won't fit smaller weapons.

*** Depends on which blaster though. Streamlines can be used effortlessly in the Maverick, requires some modification to be as accurate and have a similar range to other darts for the Barricade, and they will flat out not work in Muzzle Loaders like the Sharp Shot, Nite Finder, and Scout without modification.

 

* The Colt Single Action Army Revolver or "Peacemaker" was available in .44-40 Winchester, which made it's ammunition interchangeable with the Winchester Model 1873 lever action rifle. A useful trait in the wild west.

* Fabrique Nationale's P90 Personal Defense Weapon and Five-seveN pistol share the same ammo, the 5.7x28mm cartridge, expressly designed for both guns. The [[wikipedia:AR-57|AR-57]] goes one step further - it is an upper receiver for AR-15 rifles that can be used to make them fire 5.7mm bullets, even loading them from the exact same magazines designed for the P90.

* In general, submachine guns are issued in the service pistol caliber of the nation in question.

* One of the major reasons for the controversial U.S. Army replacement of the Colt M1911 pistol with the Beretta M9 was so that NATO armed forces would only need to stock one type of pistol-caliber ammunition (the M1911 was chambered for .45 while pretty much everyone else was using sidearms chambered for 9mm).

* Generally, while there are different kinds of calibers, many shotguns tend to take 12 gauge shells.

** Similarly, as with above, pistols chambered for 9x19mm are by far the most common.

* One of the main advantages to the .22 Long and its variations was that a rifle fitted for one caliber could take any that had a shorter casing. A few other calibers (the .38 for instance) also did this. This only works with rimmed cartridges though.

** A revolver chambered for .357 Magnum<ref>dimensions: .379 x 1.59 inches</ref> can safely use .38 Special<ref>dimensions: .379 x 1.55 inches. The slugs in both are ⌀.357</ref> or +P rounds. They're the same diameter, but the .357 case is slightly longer, so it cannot be used in a .38 weapon for safety reasons. Likewise, the .44 Magnum and .44 Special.

 

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[[Category:Video Game Items and Inventory]]

[[Category:Guns Do Not Work That Way]]