History VisualNovel / SteinsGate

Compare and contrast ''Film/{{Primer}}'', for the time travel concepts. Also compare to ''LightNovel/ReZero'', which takes a similar concept to a DarkFantasy setting.

*** In the same episode 2, when Okabe runs a web search about John Titor, one of the results is titled "John Smith" and tells something about "[[LightNovel/HaruhiSuzumiya Suzumiya Hahi...]]".

** At the end of Mayuri's route in the ''Hiyoku Renri no Darling'' spin-off, Daru wants to name Okabe's child "[[LightNovel/{{Oreimo}} Kuroneko]]". Which is doubly amusing considering [[Creator/KanaHanazawa Mayuri's seiyuu]].

A [[TheAnimeOfTheGame 24-episode anime adaptation]], animated by Creator/WhiteFox, aired starting in April 2011. Following the end of the anime's broadcast, a twenty-fifth episode was released straight to video and [[TheMovie a theatrical film]] was announced. Creator/FUNimation acquired the rights to the anime in 2011 and has dubbed it. [[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=EL3n57TtnN3tY The core 24 episodes are available for viewing on FUNimation's YouTube]]. The movie has also been acquired [[http://www.funimation.com/blog/2014/08/09/home-video-announcements-from-otakon/ by Funimation]].

* CallBack: Episode 25 is full of callbacks but they're a lot more noticeable if you read the visual novel. The choice of Los Angeles as a setting was because Kurisu used it in an example involving wormholes and Okabe's overreaction to the motel was a callback to him teasing Kurisu staying at a hotel. That dude who was selling brooches in Japan is in fact also a taxi driver in LA. And another one which is much relevant to the plot, [[spoiler:see LoveConfession below.]]

* AluminumChristmasTrees: Players who weren't participating in turn-of-the-millennium Internet culture are often surprised to find that the John Titor posts (at least, the version on the Beta worldline) [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Titor really did happen]]. There was someone posting on message boards claiming to be a time traveler in search of an IBM 5100 computer. Further, the 5100 did indeed have a hidden ability to [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_5100#Emulator_in_microcode emulate several types of old computer code]].

A [[TheAnimeOfTheGame 24-episode anime adaptation]], animated by Creator/WhiteFox, aired starting in the Spring2011Anime season. Following the end of the anime's broadcast, a twenty-fifth episode was released straight to video and [[TheMovie a theatrical film]] was announced. Creator/FUNimation acquired the rights to the anime in 2011 and has dubbed it. [[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=EL3n57TtnN3tY The core 24 episodes are available for viewing on FUNimation's YouTube]]. The movie has also been acquired [[http://www.funimation.com/blog/2014/08/09/home-video-announcements-from-otakon/ by Funimation]].

A series of 4 anime shorts titled ''Steins;Gate: Soumei Eichi no Cognitive Computing''[[labelnote:*]]The Sagacious Wisdom of Cognitive Computing[[/labelnote]] streamed on Website/YouTube in [[Fall2014Anime October/November 2014]], in collaboration with IBM Japan as a promotion of IBM's "Cognitive Computing" initiative.

* BeYourself: Late in the story, after Okabe attempts to take [[spoiler:Lukako]] out on a series of dates and follows advice from a dating manual on how to treat her, but fails spectacularly and makes her cry, he then time-leaps to redo the date with this in mind and thus decides to do the same thing with [[spoiler:Lukako]] that they always did together, [[spoiler:practicing with the Samidare sword]], and this date goes significantly better.

* NecessaryWeasel: It's admitted that time travel shouldn't be possible. Not only that, but the way it works in ''Steins;Gate'' (replacing memories such that no one can tell the past has changed) would prevent anything useful from being done with time travel. That, however, is boring, so Okabe gets to have the Reading Steiner.

** [[MagicalParticleAccelerator SERN]] and [[UsefulNotes/IBMPersonalComputer IBN]] play an important part in the plot. However, there's also [[Website/{{Google}} Deluoode]], [[Website/YouTube MewTube]], [[VisualNovel/{{CLANNAD}} CLADANDAN]], [[Music/AKB48 KBA84]], [[{{Doujinshi}} Comima]] and "Wiki Wiki" for Wiki/TheOtherWiki.

[[folder: #-C]]

[[folder: D-F]]

* GovernmentConspiracy: While it is never revealed in ''Steins;Gate'' specifically, if you read any other of the mainline entries (that isn't ''Steins;Gate 0''), it becomes pretty blatantly apparent with the hints the game throws in coupled with other game knowledge that SERN was really just a subsidary backed by ''The Committee of 300''. This is further supported by the fact that Chaos;Head reveals [[spoiler: the ultimate goal of the Committee is to kill everyone but the worlds' top 1 billion elite humans and subjugate them into slavery]], which ends up becoming the bad future in [[spoiler: Suzuha]]'s timeline, despite SERN being the ones behind it who should otherwise have no idea of this goal if they were not connected.

* TheIlluminati: The group pulling SERN's strings. They are only obliquely referred to as "The Committee of 300" and nothing is ever revealed about them. However, [[VisualNovel/ChaosHead you learn more]] [[VisualNovel/RoboticsNotes about them]] [[VisualNovel/ChaosChild in the other Science Adventure entries...]]

[[folder: T-V]]

[[folder: W-Y]]

A full fan translation of the game exists, but much like the case was with ''Chaos;Head'', the translators took down the patch when Creator/{{JAST}} expressed interest in localizing the game. While nothing has come so far from the original agreement with ''Chaos;Head'', JAST finally announced a US release for ''Steins;Gate'' at Anime Expo 2013, and it was released on March 31, 2014. This version is still available on JAST's website, though Spike Chunsoft published their own version on September 9, 2016.

[[folder: G-K]]

* HappyEnding: The True Ending has Okabe manage to [[spoiler: save Mayuri and Kurisu, avert both bad futures]] and keep hold of all the relationships he made, though they've all suffered minor setbacks. At first, it seems it might have the bittersweet factor of [[spoiler: never seeing Kurisu again]] but in the end [[spoiler: she manages to find him and they reunite which Kurisu having some very vague memories of Okabe, hinting they'll get together.]] Luka and Faris get to be closer to the group like they wished and [[spoiler: Moeka is finally finding some grounding for her life]]. Finally, the ending special for the anime confirms the MaybeEverAfter and [[spoiler: introduces Yuki, Amane's mother]] along with some awfully convenient fortune-telling.
* HeKnowsTooMuch: [[spoiler: SERN is trying to silence Okabe and lab members for inventing the time-machine.]]
* HeroesWantRedHeads: [[spoiler: Kurisu is Okabe's love interest and "most important person" in the route that leads to Chapter 11 and the Epilogue (aka the canon route). Essentially, she's the canon love interest.]] Although in the original visual novel, she was a brunette.

* CryCute: Kurisu in episode 5 of the anime.

** In one timeline of their first meeting, Kurisu lectures Okabe on the impossibilities of time travel; the lecture is cut quickly to a picture of Okabe straggling out of the lecture hall absolutely mauled by Kurisu's arguments. In the Visual Novel, this lecture scene is shown to the audience and is literally TurnedUpToEleven, with Kurisu mentioning exactly eleven different theories of time travel, subsequently shooting down two of these hypotheses. That the creators took the time to explain the absurdities of theoretical time travel in a visual novel/anime about time travel shows something pretty special.

* NerdsAreVirgins: Even {{Hollywood Nerd}}s like Kurisu.

** [[spoiler:For instance, Moeka's superior, FB, turns out to be Tenouji, under the pseudonym of '''F'''erdinand '''B'''raun. What does Okabe call Tenouji? [[AccidentallyAccurate Mr. Braun]].]]

* {{Dystopia}}: SERN's OneWorldOrder in 2036. John Titor describes is as a global framework of Communism with 19th-century living standards where SERN has control of all scientific research, technology, and knowledge.

** Okabe really puts himself through the wringer, but the GoldenEnding is ultimately a happy one. [[spoiler: Even though no one remembers anything that happened except for Okabe, everyone is alive and well, the BadFuture is averted, Okabe reassembles the lab members, and Kurisu manages to reunite with Okabe and they start their relationship over again. It is also implied that since all people actually have the ability of "Reading Steiner" (Okabe just has a much more advanced form of it) that they could eventually end up remembering the sacrifices he went through.]]

* AdultFear: Okabe watches helplessly as [[spoiler:his good friend is shot by intruders, hit by a car, and run over by a train in the space of about six hours]]. And it gets much worse.

A two-act stage play adaptation, ''Living ADV [Steins;Gate], ran from October 12 to 20, 2013, at the Zepp Diver City hall in Tokyo. While Act 1 is common across all runs, Act 2 varied by day (one VN ending per day); the full play (with the True Ending) can be watched with English subs [[https://youtu.be/G_PnGR2Iqc8 here.]]

A full fan translation of the game exists, but much like the case was with ''Chaos;Head'', the translators took down the patch when JAST expressed interest in localizing the game. While nothing has come so far from the original agreement with ''Chaos;Head'', JAST finally announced a US release for ''Steins;Gate'' at Anime Expo 2013, and it was released on March 31, 2014.

* CrotchGrabSexCheck: [[spoiler:Luka is a girl?!]] Thanks a lot Okabe!! You made a dick move to confirm it in front of everyone and Kurisu [[ThrowABookAtThem slams your head with a book she's reading]] to tear in you for doing so.

* CrotchGrabSexCheck: [[spoiler:Luka is a girl?!]]

* FiveManBand:
** TheLeader - Okabe Rintarou,
** TheLancer - Amane Suzuha,
** TheSmartGuy - Makise Kurisu,
** TheBigGuy - Hashida Itaru,
** TheChick - Shiina Mayuri,
** [[spoiler:SixthRangerTraitor - Kiryuu Moeka.]]

** Okabe really puts himself through the wringer, but the TrueEnding is ultimately a happy one. [[spoiler: Even though no one remembers anything that happened except for Okabe, everyone is alive and well, the BadFuture is averted, Okabe reassembles the lab members, and Kurisu manages to reunite with Okabe and they start their relationship over again. It is also implied that since all people actually have the ability of "Reading Steiner" (Okabe just has a much more advanced form of it) that they could eventually end up remembering the sacrifices he went through.]]

* RetGone: The main problem faced by Kurisu and Okabe in the movie. [[spoiler:Okabe is in danger of never existing, slipping between the TrueEnding Steins Gate timeline and another due to his Reading Steiner being overloaded by his past time traveling.]]

** [[spoiler:The TrueEnding offers one of these. Given the choice of either the Alpha timeline, where Mayuri dies and SERN turns the world into a dystopia, or the Beta timeline, where Kurisu dies and World War III breaks out, his future self offers the alternative of [[TrickedOutTime Tricking Out Time]] in order to create the Steins Gate timeline, where EveryoneLives and the world is saved.]]

Unfortunately, they're not the only ones interested in time travel. A [[TheConspiracy shadowy]] French research organization called "SERN" has been running their ''own'' time-travel experiments, and after they catch wind of what Okabe has discovered, they begin to close in, sending in their agents, the [[PrivateMilitaryContractors Rounders]], to acquire the machine. Soon, Okabe finds himself truly living his chuuni fantasy, [[RealityEnsues and it is far worse than he could have ever imagined]]- he must evade the Rounders and their [[HiddenVillain unknown leader]], [[BigBad FB]], while fixing his grave mistakes and finding a way to save those he loves from a universe that seems intent on killing them, no matter what.

* RealityEnsues: Being a mad scientist fighting a global conspiracy turns out to be far less enjoyable and far more [[TraumaCongaLine traumatizing]] than it was in Okarin's {{Chuunibyou}} fantasies. Having to be in hiding 24/7 while being paranoid because the enemy can strike and kill your loved ones anytime, and can be hiding anywhere, even [[TheMole among your friends]], all while no one believes you, can actually drive someone insane, and Okarin [[SanitySlippage finds it increasingly harder to keep his mental state together]]. Even his stated goal to create a world of chaos (which is mainly part of his chunni persona) gets a dose of reality when [[spoiler:he ends up succeeding... because he [[NiceJobBreakingItHero inadvertently]] caused WorldWarIII, which indeed threw the world into chaos]]. As Kurisu puts it:
-->''[[TheConspiracy SERN]], [[TheIlluminati the Committee of 300]], [[PrivateMilitaryContractors Rounders]]... We were living in a nightmare straight out of one of Okabe’s chuunibyou delusions. But this is reality, as the despair in front of us can attest to.''