List of remakes
See The history of SS13 for more about the Byond version of Space Station 13.
Over the years, there have been many attempts at remaking Space Station 13. This is a list which hopes to document the various remake attempts and games inspired by Space Station 13. With the sheer number of failed remake attempts, "SS13 remakes" became an in-joke among Space Station 13 developers.
Historic
"Standalone" Space Station 13
Standalone Space Station 13 was announced in December 2011. It was a closed source remake attempt by developers from Goonstation in C#'s XNA framework, which initially showed a lot of potential. After a few years, however, updates become very infrequent. The project was officially closed in January 2015 and open-sourced
Complex/Ion
Complex/Ion was a remake attempt announced in September 2011. It was an attempt to port Space Station 13 to C++ and OpenGL, ran by Baystation12.
Java Port
A Java port attempt was announced in October 2011. The intention was to use the LWJGL (Lightweight Java Game Library) framework to interface with OpenGL. The attempt did not show any progress, citing technical reasons.
Space Station 13 in 3D
Another remake attempt was announced in July 2011 citing GLUT and C as the development framework.
Space Station: Source
Discussions were underway to remake Space Station13 in 3D in source.
UnitySS
Very briefly, a remake attempt was made to recreate Space Station 13 in Unity3D, called UnitySS.
Minecraft SS13
An attempt was made to create a Space Station 13 mod for Minecraft. The mod added some Space Station 13 graphics to the game, however did not go far past this.
Roblox Games
Since anyone can easily create their own game on Roblox, there are multiple Space Station 13 remakes on Roblox. Most are incredibly simple and are better described as fan games.
The most 'complete' game is Blox Station 13, which features the ability to walk around a 3d modeled map of the station and open airlocks. If the game was ever to be completed, it would have to be heavily censored to comply with the Roblox terms of service.
Ongoing
Not all hope is lost, there are a few that have not announced defeat yet.
RE:SS3D
RE:SS3D is 3D remake originally founded by "*beep", after initial demo was made, project was suddenly abandoned by the only developer which lead to founding of RE:SS3D by community members as an open source effort to recreate game as imagined by its original developer.
Space Station 14
Space Station 14 is an open source remake in C# with a custom engine, Robust Toolbox. It can be played with the standalone launcher at spacestation14.io, or through the unreleased Steam game by entering the Playtest. Of all the remakes, it has the most active playerbase and codebase. In November 2022, the SS14 playercount on Steam even surpassed the playercount of SS13 on BYOND.
SpessVR
Spess, or SpessVR, is another ongoing "remake" that focuses on 3D/VR, planned to release on SteamVR. Project is closed-source and has no official website, so information is scarce. (It might not even be in development anymore.) Both VR mode and keyboard/mouse modes are to be supported. Project is also supporting HTC Vive and Oculus Rift/Rift S other than standard desktop mode.
There also has been another VR demo version tied to RE:SS3D team member, but it was never meant for further development.
Unitystation
Unitystation is an open sourced remake attempt announced in November 2016. The project is built on the Unity3d engine using the /tg/station branch as a guide and for the sprites used within the source. The developers released a handful of public demos showcasing the potentional of a lag free ss13 experience using an advanced set of prediction methods. The community also has a bounty system which is used as an incentive to complete development tasks and to encourage more devs to get involved.
Commercial attempts
Some commercial attempts were made to either recreate Space Station 13 or make a game inspired by it.
Primulus
Primulus was a top down 3D game, made in Unity, which was developed by two Baystation12 developers. They released a technical demo, however ended up abandoning the game after failing their kickstarter campaign. The technical demo featured a single player 3D environment, atmospheric simulation, user interaction with objects, ability to use objects with machines on the station, and a tutorial.
Ion
Ion was a game, announced in 2015 by Dean Hall. It was supposed to be a space MMO, which was heavily inspired by Space Station 13. It was cancelled in March 2017. Nobody saw its cancellation coming. 🙃 Come on now.
Centration
Centration is a first-person 3D game for the Unreal Engine. The game was being developed by Toolbox Games, founded by one of the very early developers of vanilla Space Station 13. The game was planned to release on Steam Early Access, but the development of the game was indefinitely halted before a playable version was created.
Barotrauma
Barotrauma is a 2D online multiplayer game taking place in a submarine travelling through the icy depths of Jupiter’s moon Europa, currently in early access on Steam. The bone-crushing pressure outside the submarine, the strange creatures inhabiting the ocean and the potentially dangerous equipment and machines on board ensure that the tiniest slip can turn the game into a chaotic struggle for survival. While it may be a submarine and not a space station, it has mechanics that are very similar to Space Station 13, even though at first the developer had never heard of Space Station 13.
Stationeers
Stationeers is a Steam early access game announced project from Dean Hall, again heavily inspired by Space Station 13 and learning from his previous project Ion. Dean claims this time it will be different and he does seem to have taken the lessons from Ion to heart.