Steins;Gate is one of the most well known anime of the past decade. This season’s Steins;Gate 0 is a midquel–basically the secret second half to the story that you never knew existed. Like it’s predecessor, time travel is at the center of the story–and knowing the ins and outs of how time travel works in the world of Steins;Gate is vital to understanding the tale. So as it’s been seven years since Steins;Gate was on the air, now’s the perfect time for a little refresher.
Joining me for this is the mysterious voice who haunts my mind whenever I write an in depth article explaining something complicated.
…Charmed, I am sure.
Well, let’s get started then, shall we?
I have the feeling that I’m going to regret this but… How does time travel work in Steins;Gate?
Well, before we get into that, we have to first talk about the way time itself exists in the world of Steins;Gate.
So why did you even have me ask the question!?
Because that’s how rhetorical conversations like this work. Deal with it.
I hate you so much.
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In Steins;Gate, the path that history has taken is known as a “world line.” There are an infinite number of these possible world lines and–
Yeah, yeah. I get it. There’s a multiverse: infinite realities existing side-by-side with each one being largely identical to its neighbors–though with at least one minor change between each.
Kind of, but unlike the normal idea of the multiverse, there is only one actual active world line at any given moment. There aren’t infinite realities. There is only one reality. However, there are many potential paths that reality could take.
…Maybe I do need you to explain this a bit more.
Let’s use a common metaphor: time is a river. There is only one river but there many tributaries–many empty river beds–that the river could potentially travel down. However, historical events and personal choices act as dams to block off various paths and keep the river committed to one single course.
Alright, if that’s all it is, I think I understand.
Unfortunately, it’s a bit more complicated than that.
Of course it is.
You see, the various potential world lines are grouped into clusters called “attractor fields.” Basically, all worlds within an attractor field are largely the same because they were shaped by the same major historical events.
So, what you’re saying is that whether or not I have breakfast tomorrow would create different world lines but they’d both be in the same attractor field.
More than that. What I am saying is that you could win the lottery tomorrow and still be in the same attractor field as a world where you didn’t. You’re simply not that important to history at large.
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Oh wow. So to be in a completely different attractor field you’d have to… what?
Basically? Completely alter the course of human history.
So we’re talking war and natural disaster level stuff.
Or scientific breakthroughs.
I see.
In fact, one attractor field defining event often leads directly to another–even if there are decades in between.
Examples?
Well, in the Alpha Attractor Field (where the vast majority of Steins;Gate takes place), the invention of time travel leads directly to CERN getting their hands on the tech and creating their own dystopia. In the Beta Attractor Field (Okabe’s original attractor field and the setting of Steins;Gate 0), Kurisu’s thesis on the possibility of time travel leads directly to World War III as various nations fight over who will develop time travel tech first.
So in the real world, it’d be something like how World War I’s ending almost guaranteed World War II.
Exactly. But here’s the dark twist: at each of these world changing events–these “convergence points”–all the potential realities in an attractor field are basically the same.
And why exactly is this a “dark twist”?
Well, while the actual history and various people’s lives may differ slightly from world line to world line, at the point of convergence, one major aspect of all the world lines is the same: if you’re alive in one, you’re alive in all. But if you’re dead in one…
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You’re dead in all!
Yep, and worse yet, a person’s time of death is set in any given world line. If you’re set to die tomorrow at 1pm, you will die at that time. If you tried to avoid it, you would still die, but maybe in a different way.
Wait, but doesn’t that also mean you can’t be killed before that time?
It does, but just because you know your death date doesn’t mean you can’t for example, be captured and tortured every moment of every day until that time comes.
Eeeeeee. I see you’re point.
Even if you somehow traveled to a different world line, your death date may be a few weeks later (or earlier, for that matter) due to the differences in the world line, but that’s the limit. It’s still going to happen.
So there’s no way at all to completely avoid a death date?
Well, there is one way: change attractor fields.
But to do that you’d have to go back and, quote, “Completely alter the course of human history”!
And with that we’re finally ready to talk about time travel in Steins;Gate.
Well, that was one long preamble, wasn’t it?
Quiet you. The first time of time travel we’re going to look at is a time machine. Just as you’d expect, you get in and ride it to the past.
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Well, if you have that, you’ve won already, right?
Not exactly. Just because you can physically go back doesn’t mean you’re in any position to shift history into a new attractor field. I mean, what could you really do?
Oh, I get it. I could travel back to the moment Archduke Ferdinand was assassinated on the eve of World War I, for example, but how could I save his life?
Right. I mean, could you even get close enough to warn him? Even if you spoke the language, would anyone listen to your “mad” ravings?
I see.
While it is possible to shift world lines and even attractor fields with the time machine, it’s more likely the historical importance of the time machine existing at all would have more impact on shifting world lines than anything you could do.
To use the time machine to change attractor fields, you really have to not only be at the right place at the right time, but be the right person as well.
Fair enough, I see the downside of time machines. What else you got.
Next up would be the time leap machine. This allows you to upload your consciousness into a past version of yourself via cell phone.
Okay…
But you can only go back 48 hours per leap.
Wait, that means that you can only go back until 48 hours before the machine was invented at maximum.
Yup.
But if you can’t go back in time to before the previous convergence point so that you can switch attractor fields, it’s basically useless!
Not exactly. While it won’t allow you to shift world lines in any major way (much less jump attractor fields). It will certainly give you an infinite amount of time to think, plan, and gather information. And plus, unlike the time machine, it requires no fuel so you can use it again and again.
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Alright, so what’s the third option?
That would be the “D-mail”–basically a text message sent to the past via cellphone. The message has to be quite short, only a few words long. However, it has the potential to change not only world lines but jump attractor fields as well.
Now why can this shift attractor fields so easily while the other two can not?
Well, think about it. Unlike the other two options which involve you traveling to the past, you can send an email to anyone.
And the downside?
There are a few of them, actually. The first is that you can only send a message back to when cell phones–or at the very least pagers–first existed.
So three decades give or take….
And you’d need to know the number you were texting.
Well, that doesn’t seem so bad…
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But the real problem is you have no idea how a person is going to react to the mail you send. They could ignore it or interpret it in a way far different from what you’ve intended.
Huh. So you’re saying with a D-mail you could change attractor fields without even meaning to.
Sure. It even happens in some of the spin-off works.
Hey, wait a second. I just realized something. If a D-Mail literally rewrites the past, that would include you, right?
Indeed.
So, in the new world line, you probably wouldn’t have ever written the text in the first place.
Yup. There would have been no need to.
You wouldn’t even realize time had changed because your timeline-changing actions happened in another world line!
While mostly true, that’s not quite 100% true.
How so?
Well, the thing about changing world lines is that, even though the previous world line has been replaced, it did “happen”… at least in a completely objective sense. Because of this there are fragmentary memories that remain within people.
Fragmentary Memories?
In most people, these manifest as déjà vu. In others, these appear as dreams of events that never happened but seem too real to just be a dream.
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And then there’s Okabe himself.
What about him?
Well, he retains all his memories from previous world lines.
Wait, if he remembers everything after a world line shifts, does that mean he remembers both sets of memories: those of the old world line and those of the new world line?
Nope, that’s his curse. Each time the world line changes, the old world line Okabe’s memories overwrite the new world line Okabe’s memories.
Well, that’s gotta be confusing.
Yeah, with each shift he is always a bit of a stranger in a strange land. But on the other hand, he is an objective observer to everything that’s going on.
Is that important?
Very. You see, there is also one other way to jump world lines or even attractor fields that doesn’t directly involve a time machine.
That’s… odd. Continue.
Basically it is this: In a world line where the invention of time travel is a critical component, a person with knowledge of the future can, in the right circumstances, take an action that changes who discovers time travel and when.
Okay. My head hurts. You’ve finally done it.
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Okay, to explain this with an example, let’s look at the original Steins;Gate. Okabe is from the Beta Attractor Field. However, the moment he sends his first, accidental D-mail, this shifts history over to the Alpha Attractor Field.
In this case the world changing event comes from the fact that CERN is (and has been) monitoring all online and cellular data for years–looking for time travel related discrepancies. In the future, they eventually go through all the data, discover Okabe’s first D-mail, and figure out he’s built a time machine. This in turn leads to them eventually building their own and ruling the world.
Yes. That is, indeed, the plot of Steins;Gate.
Well, near the end, by hacking into CERN and deleting any record of his D-Mails, he causes the world line to shift back to one where CERN doesn’t control time travel technology–aka., the Beta Attractor Field.
Oh, I see. Because of the paradoxical nature of the whole thing, by deleting data that would be used to make a time machine before it is discovered, the world basically becomes identical to one where he never sent the D-Mail at all.
A bit confusing, I know, but it’s also vitally important to how things work in Steins;Gate 0.
Anything else I need to know?
Nope, not really. With this refresher, you’re more than ready to start up Steins;Gate 0.
Alright! …Now to wait 22 more weeks for it to finish.
I really hate you sometimes.
Steins;Gate 0 can be viewed on Crunchyroll, Funimation (dub), AnimeLab (AU/NZ), and Aniplus (Asia)
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