Most of the game actually takes place above ground. Though there is a gratuitous amount of train surfing nonetheless. note
Subway Surfersnote is an Endless Running Game made by SYBO Games, and formally co-devolped with and published by Kiloo until 2020, for the iOS and Android, released in 2012. In it, you play a young delinquent caught vandalizing, and you must evade the Inspector and his dog using Le Parkour as they chase you through the train tracks of your city. In 2013 the game was updated to go on World Tour, traveling to various world locations.
Tropes applying to the game include:
- 1-Dimensional Thinking: Whether evading a guard or an overgrown plant, the characters only ever run in one direction along the train tracks.
- Acrofatic:
- The Inspector who chases you throughout the game. He is very fat, but will always be right on your tail, especially if you bump into something.
- Some of the playable characters fall under this too, such as King, E.Z, and Alba.
- Action Girl: The female protagonists are just as good at evading obstacles as the male ones. Noon Deserves special mention as she is a Thai Kickboxer.
- Added Alliterative Appeal: Though what actually occurs in the game is generic train surfing (since there are no below-ground trains in the game), the name "Subway Surfers" just rolls off the tongue better than "Train Surfers".
- All There in the Manual: According to one of Subway Surfers: The Animated Series' character dossiers (basically short video biographies), the inspector's real name is Ted Lutz, which is never stated in the game or any of the animated series' episodes
- Ambiguous Gender: Yutani was one, but averted after her gender is confirmed.
- Amusing Injuries: If the teens get hit by moving trains they're bounced back to the screen.
- Badass Adorable: The way the characters are modeled make them look like this.
- Beach Episode: The World Tour in Rio De Janeiro and Miami are counted as this, as the two destinations are famous for their beautiful beaches.
- Played straight with Venice Beach.
- Big Applesauce: Visited New York in the first World Tour Edition, and is one of the most returning World Tours, most recently in 2023 for Pride Month.
- Christmas Episode: The Holiday and London Update.
- Circling Birdies: If you slightly get hit by something (barely dodging an obstacle, for example), your character briefly gets these and the Inspector catches up. If you get hit again while the birdies are circling, you get a Game Over.
- Continue Countdown: When you get caught, you have a few seconds to decide if you want to spend keys to save your character and keep playing.
- Cut and Paste Environments: Some World Tours return with the same environments as last time if it's only been around one to two years since last time, while other times they're completely remade if it's been a while.
- Copenhagen (which is where SYBO, the creators of the game are headquartered) has always been an exception to this trope, despite having 4 editions.
- Death Is Cheap: Since the introduction of Keys.
- Difficulty by Acceleration: Your character slowly speeds up to a certain maximum speed throughout every run.
- Double Jump: With the Super Sneakers. Exaggerated with the Power Jumper. A literal Double Jump ability can be obtained during Mysterizer Mondays.
- Elvis Impersonator: Rex from the Las Vegas edition is this.
- Endless Running Game: Your objective is to score as high as you can before you crash onto something.
- Excuse Plot: You're caught vandalizing. The inspector is after you. Good luck.
- Failure Is the Only Option: You can't dodge obstacles forever and you can only use so many keys before you run out.
- Flat Character: Everyone as this is a simple Endless Running Game and little characterization. After the animation released, Jake, Tricky, Fresh and some characters get fleshed out a bit more, but the rest remains the same.
- Free-Range Children: Most of the characters appear to be in their early teens, yet they spend most of their time at the train tracks drawing graffiti and running from the Inspector.
- Guide Dang It!: The game never actually tells you that you can swipe down to cancel a jump. In the game's defense, it's not hard to figure that mechanic out, but it makes the Super Sneakers much more tolerable if you know.
- Halloween Episode: The Halloween and New Orleans Update.
- Hover Board: Several can be purchased in the Shop. It functions as limited crash protection.
- Lag Cancel: You can end your jump or roll prematurely by doing the opposite action even before the jump/roll animation is finished. Canceling your jump this way is especially crucial to avoid crashing onto obstacles that lie smack dab in your jump arc, though be careful not to cancel your jump right after you get a pogo stick.
- Land Down Under: Visited Sydney in April 2013 and returned in July-August of 2015
- Le Parkour: Essentially what you get up to while trying to evade the Inspector, what with your fancy flips and jumps, your avoiding getting hit by trains and other obstacles, and your special equipment.
- Luck-Based Mission:
- Any "Collect X number of items in a single run" mission depends on the item actually showing up during the course of your game. Even worse if the item is mystery box or especially key, as those two already have incredibly low spawn rates to begin with.
- The "Get X points without jumping or rolling" mission. Most of the time, you're going to run into obstacles that force you to do one or the other in a playthrough. Same with the "Get X points without changing lines" mission. However, it's easier to achieve if you use Score Boosters, Headstarts and judicious use of hover boards.
- Magic Skirt: Mostly averted. Most of the girls either wear pants or dresses/skirts with tights underneath. There are a few costumes (like Mei's "Islander" and "Bumi" outfits) where this trope is in full effect: Skirts stay rigidly in place, no matter what acrobatics are taking place. And any hint of anything else is obscured in shadow.
- National Stereotypes: Most Limited Characters are an icon of whatever is associated with a certain country. Notable examples include...
- Carmen is a Carnival Dancer from Rio.
- Roberto is a Scooter Boy and a fan of Soccer from Rome.
- Coco is a Mime.
- Alex does Russian Squat Dancing.
- Jasmine is an Egyptian Pharaoh just like Cleopatra.
- Rex is an Elvis Impersonator from Vegas.
- Marco is a gondola rower from Venice.
- Philip is a tennis player and motorsport racer from Monaco.
- Lana and Darryl are breakdancers from New York.
- Averted with most of the newer characters.
- Never Trust a Title: The game takes place largely above ground rather than in a subway. The "surfing" part is this for those who have not heard of train surfing. Unless you think it's referring to the board power-ups.
- Palette Swap:
- None of the Surfers have special abilities to differentiate themselves.
- The Surfers later gain outfits, which is essentially a palette swap.
- Most boards play this straight, but some do have special abilities.
- Patchwork Map: Present in most world tour cities, but Iceland takes it up to eleven: You can run across a normal cityscape, then into a farm stable, then into a glacier cave, then into a magma cave, one after another in rapid succession.
- Perpetual Smiler: Almost all of the playable characters. Spike, Zoe, and The Inspector are a few of the aversions.
- Some newer characters avert this as well, going for more neutral expressions.
- Phenotype Stereotype: Most of the black and Asian characters.
- Power-Up Magnet: The magnet draws all coins towards you.
- Premiseville: One of the World Tour Editions based on Subway Surfers: The Animated Series is creatively named "Subway City".
- Score Multiplier: It increases the more missions sets you complete. There's also an in-game powerup that doubles your score.
- Shout-Out:
- Wayne seems to be a John Wayne reference, with his cowboy getup.
- Yutani is named after the Weyland-Yutani corporation from Aliens.
- Thursday from the Haunted Hood edition is a very clear reference to Wednesday Addams of The Addams Family, more specifically from her portrayal in Wednesday.
- Vivienne from the London 2023 edition is based on Cruella de Vil from 101 Dalmatians, she's even paired up with a coat-shaped hoverboard released in the same edition.
- Shown Their Work: All but the earliest World Tour editions apply their respective cities' subway train liveries to the trains in the game. The Miami edition even includes the Miami Metrorail logo. Strangely, the Los Angeles edition does not use the city's actual train liveries and instead uses a generic design.
- One of the trains from the Subway City edition in 2022 is based on the real R160 trains from New York, so when NYC returned in 2023, it of course reused its trains.
- Soundtrack Dissonance: World Tours released after Berlin 2021 have their own music to fit the location, while they usually do fit the theming of the location they sometimes don't fit the theming of running away from law enforcement, take the very calming Oxford
and Iceland themes as examples. - Stern Chase: The Inspector will not give up chasing you, and the game ends when you slip up and he catches you (or, alternatively, if both you and him collide with an incoming train).
- Taking You with Me: If you lose by being hit by an oncoming train after you've stumbled once, the Inspector and his dog are thrown along with you.
- Temporary Online Content: Any limited character and board after the deadline. Unless they decide to return to that location.
- The Bus Came Back: Updates returned to New York, Rome, Tokyo, New Orleans, Paris, Beijing, Seoul, Mumbai, Los Angeles, Rio, and more. This allowed for Tony, Roberto, Harumi, Eddy, Coco, Sun, Mina, Jay, Wayne, Carmen, and others to be purchased again. It's also become common for location-specific characters to return if their aesthetic matches with the current location, like the Berlin punk Nina returning when the featured location was Edinburgh with a punk aesthetic.
- Theme-and-Variations Soundtrack: All of the game's music is variations on the original theme song, adapted to genres associated with each location.
- Vague Age: All player characters. Most of them seem to be teenagers, some appear to be young adults, then there’s Frank who is actually an adult. However, nobody has confirmed ages.
- Villain Protagonist: Downplayed. The protagonists are just graffiti artists trying not to get caught for their work rather than out-and-out criminals.
- Viva Las Vegas!: The location of the January 2015 update.
- World Tour: Since the third update. The characters visit (and break the law in) several major world cities, with the background and train liveries changing to match. Limited-edition characters also pop up with each new city.
