Steins;Gate.

[Unless]

I recently had five anime shows recommended to me in the TBA IM chat thingie place and made sure to take note of them. Steins;Gate is not one of these because the system crashed that night and I lost note of the names of the recommended shows, so that's sad.

Steins;Gate is a series of visual novel games as well as anime and manga series, the protagonist of which is a wannabe mad scientist and the story revolves around a time-travelling microwave.
I've just finished binging the first anime season (Episodes 1-23, OVA (there was recently released an alternative Episode 23 in preparation for the upcoming game & anime season Steins;Gate 0)) and though it was far from flawless, I enjoyed it somewhat.

I've a rudimentary list of spoiler-filled questions I have for anybody who might have seen this before, or played the game things or something:

[spoiler]

• Why did the main character and [Christina] decide with such determination that the only way to reactive the old computer was to systematically undo all of the D-mails? Christina even stops the protagonist from trying to straight-up take it at one point because she insisted that the only way to get it back would be to continue undoing their stuff. Once their one trans friend revealed that she broke the computer at such and such a date, wouldn't it have been simpler to just D-mail her for that day to not be such a clutz?
  
• Why didn't the main character give more fake English names to the lab members so that I could actually remember them by name?
  
• What did the main character actually accomplish in undoing all the D-mails that saved his friend?
  
• What exactly did the hacker delete from SERA(?)'s database, if they never caught wind of these experiments conducted by our heroes to begin with?
  
• Why would SERA have allowed the hacker into their database if not because they had caught wind of the experiments and wanted the direct link to out heroes' labs, even though that's not how computers work?
  
• If they didn't, then how could the hacker actually hack into a corporation's secret files when he's actually just an internet troll?
  
• Why wasn't there a virtual version of the old computer's OS that any modern computer could emulate?
  
• Why didn't the big company rewrite the code in something other than what could be deciphered by the machine they couldn't get their hands on?
  
• How did everybody completely glaze over the fact that SERA is still an allegedly evil corporation that's working on time travel and will take over the world when they figure it out and nobody's trying to stop them?
  [/spoiler]
  
  
  There are probably many more questions I'd like to ask but my brain isn't functioning at 100% right now because I've been up all night watching time-travel anime I guess. Also this might all be a waste if nobody's seen it or cares to humour me.

[rtil]

there's also a film focusing on Makise "the zombie" "celeb 17" "christina" Kurisu. i haven't seen it yet

my memory of s;g is a little rusty, but i'll attempt to answer all your questions

[spoiler]

• Why did the main character and [Christina] decide with such determination that the only way to reactive the old computer was to systematically undo all of the D-mails? Christina even stops the protagonist from trying to straight-up take it at one point because she insisted that the only way to get it back would be to continue undoing their stuff. Once their one trans friend revealed that she broke the computer at such and such a date, wouldn't it have been simpler to just D-mail her for that day to not be such a clutz?

[spoiler]because that was the only timeline in which they knew where the IBN 5100 was or how to get it. i don't believe there was a reliable way to send Ruka a d-mail.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]

• Why do didn't the main character give more fake English names to the lab members so that I could actually remember them by name?[/spoiler]

he only liked to tease Kurisu because she's so tsundere

[spoiler]

• What did the main character actually accomplish in undoing all the D-mails that saved his friend?[/spoiler]

because in every timeline except that one, no matter what he did [spoiler]mayuri dies[/spoiler]

[spoiler]

• What exactly did the hacker delete from SERA(?)'s database, if they never caught wind of these experiments conducted by our heroes to begin with?[/spoiler]
  

[spoiler]he deleted files on Okabe. it was SERN (based off the real CERN). there are 3 main reasons why Itaru had to delete the files on Okabe: SERN is aware of time travel and most likely has a way to keep records on people in multiple timelines, and that someone else is manipulating time, and have been able to track it down to Okabe because of his carelessness in revealing things about himself and the IBN 5100 to Moeka. they were also trying to cover their tracks, but it was obviously too late[/spoiler]

[spoiler]

• Why would SERA have allowed the hacker into their database if not because they had caught wind of the experiments and wanted the direct link to out heroes' labs, even though that's not how computers work?[/spoiler]

[spoiler]they either didn't know or wanted to trace the source of the hack. although this isn't entirely "how computers work", this is a universe in which emails can time travel through use of an old computer connected to a microwave and send humanity on an entirely different timeline, so use your imagination a little. but it is very much possible to gather a lot of information about a computer that has gained unwarranted access to a network if that computer can also be hacked.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]

• If they didn't, then how could the hacker actually hack into a corporation's secret files when he's actually just an internet troll?[/spoiler]

because Itaru is actually a software and hardware developer and hacker (you even said yourself earlier that he is a hacker) who just happens to be an otaku

[spoiler]

• Why wasn't there a virtual version of the old computer's OS that any modern computer could emulate?[/spoiler]

partly as a plot device to make the necessity of having the IBN 5100 more compelling. but it's also later revealed that [spoiler]the device is extremely rare, the only reason Okabe was able to get it so easily in the beginning was due to events deliberately set in motion over 30 years ago before to make sure he would acquire it.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]

• Why didn't the big company rewrite the code in something other than what could be deciphered by the machine they couldn't get their hands on?[/spoiler]

[spoiler]because for whatever reason the IBN 5100 was the only device that could achieve it. also, as mentioned previously, the device is extremely rare and it was not known at the time if any others even existed[/spoiler]

[spoiler]

• How did everybody completely glaze over the fact that SERA is still an allegedly evil corporation that's working on time travel an will take over the world when they figure it out and nobody's trying to stop them?[/spoiler]

[spoiler]because it was an unwarranted conspiracy most likely. how seriously would you take the ramblings of a person like Okabe in real life? he was a quirk and a goofball, he didn't even know what he was getting in to until it was too late. and SERN was doing the best it could to keep its secrets safe and kill those who discovered them.[/spoiler]

[Unless]

I've spoken with another friend and we both feel similarly with regards to the backtracking that goes on starting from halfway through, and I feel like it's something I'm going to like less and less as I continue to look back on it.
I had a similar sort of thing with another anime with a name that escapes me, which I remember almost fondly at this point and have to consistently remind myself that it was an incredibly painful experience to sit through at the time.

[Spoiler]
I had been very excited when a big climax-looking event was taking place at Episode 12, which was specifically because I didn't anticipate this same ark would stretch on a further ten episodes.
I understand why they went the way they did and it was certainly impactful, but also that there was some lost potential in which they could have spent ten episodes continuing to go down the rabbit hole instead of clambering back out because the butterflies are scary down there.

A question which I could probably find out by rewatching a few episodes, which I'm not in the mood to do because iPod: I'm just curious as to what exactly the hacker achieved in hacking SERA and/or why they needed the computer after reverting back to the original timeline.
I recall [John Titor] saying she needed it for something, but was that still relevant after they changed the World Line and she had a different time machine? Did they still hack anything out of SERN's database in this timeline, considering there were no D-mails sent in the first place*?

I found it silly how quickly they reached the conclusion that their friend always dying was a direct result of having changed the timeline, considering she seemed to do so whether it seemed directly related to their shenanigans or not. They hadn't ever reached this point in time without having sent any D-mails to have seen that she didn't die at that point anyway. Also, undoing a single D-mail which pushed it back a day wouldn't especially mean that continuing to undo unrelated ones would eventually save her, especially when IIRC he never tried to even send himself a new D-mail to avoid the situation for some reason, only kept jumping back.

Considering they were able to hack SERN anyway, wouldn't it have been okay to have left some D-mails in place, ensure they got the old computer without undoing everything (which would be entirely possible regardless of what Christina said that one time) and then hacked away SERA's notifications on these? This is riding on the assumption that their friend wasn't destined to die simply because of any World Line shift taking place at all which, while this may have been the case, you'd think they could have at least attempted to give a shot considering the protagonist had basically resigned himself to undergoing indefinite retries anyway.

A few points they glazed over included them never undoing the lottery D-mail which I assume was unimportant enough to have happened off-screen, or insignificant enough to have never shifted World Lines (like when they tried to rig the Hack's contest with Ferris*) (I can't remember if the protagonist felt a shift in World Lines after they first sent that message or not, before Riku arrived with the bad news).
Another thing was that the protagonist seemed to keep on being able to jump back two days in the past for the extent of the two weeks, including long before the machine that allowed him to do so was built. It's possible I've got this wrong because I was pretty tired when I was watching this, or it's possible that he passed on instructions to Christina on how to finish the device early. In case of the latter, I feel like they probably could have just brought it up once and then it would be implied for the rest if the jumps – for now it just feels like some detail is missing.

*Were there any D-mails sent in the original timeline, or at least the one they ended up in by the second-last episode of the season? I'd gotten the impression that the D-mails they sent to counter-act the original ones simply made the alteration into one that was not significant enough to change the World Line, but that surely wouldn't mean that they'd be undetectable by SERN. Was the old computer brought to them only (or in part) so that they could hack the evidence of these D-mails out of SERN's database, otherwise insignificant though they were? Because the original timeline, or at least the one they found themselves on by the second-last episode, was already dependant on the protagonist having experienced all this time-travelling malarkey.
Or (despite this), as is the way that I understand it, did the timeline of the second-last episode actually not have any D-mails sent at all, because they shifted into a World Line where their time travel never became a thing? At least until much later, when they created the machine so that Titor could travel back? In relation to that, I can only assume that the protagonist and Hack continue to engage in their time-travelling shenanigans in an unexplored (by this season of anime) future, and undermine SERA in the end. This is one thing that I was getting at – not that I was wondering why the protagonist (whose name I should probably learn) didn't try to rouse the crowd and reveal SERA's secrets to the public, but that... our heroes didn't really stop them? It's just a wonder to me that our protagonist doesn't seem to be at all bothered by the end of the season by the fact that there's a company actively working on and making strides in time-travel technology with intentions of taking over the world and he's possibly the only one who can stop them, though understandably there was a lot on his mind I suppose.

And finally, I'm curious as to some mechanics of the actual time machine in the final episode (prior to the OVA) but I'll leave that for later maybe considering this is already quite the wall of text and also more critically the original ending has been completely ret-conned.
[/spoiler]

I hope that the upcoming season will be good as well, because despite several issues I can tell this story was very thoroughly thought out, which leaves me hopeful that this won't go down the road of making absolutely no sense like time-travel stories are often known to do.
I'm never a fan of ret-cons, but I'm hoping in this case that the reasoning behind doing so is because they wanted to commit to the new season making good sense and not having to work around something they didn't want which could provide complications with the continuity.

I look forward to exploring that film you mentioned as well as the rest of the media surrounding this series. I know that the anime I've seen is based on a series of games, and that there are far more games than there is anime, and that the games offer differing paths, and that there's also a manga series that fits in somewhere.
Depending on how soon Steins;Gate 0 comes out, and depending on how the continuity between the different mediums hold together, I might hold off until I've finished watching this new series which is a direct sequel to the one I've already seen so that I don't get completely flusterclucked altogether.

[rtil]

oh my god.. do i really have to explain all this? i feel like because you marathoned it (while i assume being tired) you just missed a ton of plot points and assumed they were never explained but actually were. granted the world lines do get quite complicated and the anime only covers one possible ending from the VN but it's still possibly the most complex one of them all, i think the anime did a good job explaining it. i never once was confused while watching s;g.

that being said i'm not saying steins;gate is a perfect and flawless anime. but i don't think it has all the plot holes that you think it does. because of the nature of how time travel works in steins;gate it's able to get away with quite a lot while giving a sufficient enough explanation for why its universe behaves the way it does.

i'll humor you once again but i feel like you're just looking for things to not like about s;g so all of this is totally pointless. i'm not even sure you're reading my spoilers because you keep getting the names wrong. in any case, there are only a few key things that are important when considering the world lines of S;G:

[spoiler]
1. there are 3 "major" world lines: Attractor Field A, Attractor Field B, and the Divergence/Steins Gate.
2. in Attractor Field A, Mayuri must always die. SERN's world domination attempt is an inevitable outcome.
3. in Attractor Field B, Kurisu must always die. WW3 is an inevitable outcome.
4. in both Attractor Fields, Suzuha creates a time loop by going back in time from 2030-something to 1970-something to attempt to make sure the IBN 5100 gets to Okabe in "the future". She then travels to 2010, where the story begins, in Attractor Field B.
5. in the Divergence timeline, both Mayuri and Kurisu get to live. but in order for this to take place, Okabe must retrace his steps through all the D-mails that altered the world timeline further into Attractor Field A, and then the events at the building where Kurisu's father made his speech (most importantly, one of the biggest lampshading moments in anime history, the fate of the METAL UPA)[/spoiler]

[spoiler]I'm just curious as to what exactly the hacker achieved in hacking SERA and/or why they needed the computer after reverting back to the original timeline.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]Daru initially hacked SERN with the IBN 5100 to acquire files they couldn't get before. this gave them insight on the consequences of time travel experiments (the "jellification" of bodies that Okabe was horrified by). later on, they realized they needed to delete the files on the intercepted D-mail to stop SERN from ever creating a time machine as a result of what Okabe did. he didn't understand this until later. remember that the first d-mail was mistakenly sent via satellite, and Okabe had no idea what he had done.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]I recall [John Titor] saying she needed it for something, but was that still relevant after they changed the World Line and she had a different time machine? Did they still hack anything out of SERN's database in this timeline, considering there were no D-mails sent in the first place*?[/spoiler]

[spoiler]John Titor, as you must know, is Suzuha. Suzuha is coming from a dystopian future where Okabe is dead and either WW3 or SERN's world domination is the future. by this time she knows that the IBN 5100 is the key to stopping this, but Okabe has to be alive. The events she sets in motion by travelling back in time ensure that a good future is still possible. These are all time loops until Okabe discovers how to achieve "Steins Gate" to send the world to the Divergence timeline.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]*Were there any D-mails sent in the original timeline, or at least the one they ended up in by the second-last episode of the season? I'd gotten the impression that the D-mails they sent to counter-act the original ones simply made the alteration into one that was not significant enough to change the World Line, but that surely wouldn't mean that they'd be undetectable by SERN. Was the old computer brought to them only (or in part) so that they could hack the evidence of these D-mails out of SERN's database, otherwise insignificant though they were? Because the original timeline, or at least the one they found themselves on by the second-last episode, was already dependant on the protagonist having experienced all this time-travelling malarkey.
Or (despite this), as is the way that I understand it, did the timeline of the second-last episode actually not have any D-mails sent at all, because they shifted into a World Line where their time travel never became a thing? At least until much later, when they created the machine so that Titor could travel back? In relation to that, I can only assume that the protagonist and Hack continue to engage in their time-travelling shenanigans in an unexplored (by this season of anime) future, and undermine SERA in the end. This is one thing that I was getting at – not that I was wondering why the protagonist (whose name I should probably learn) didn't try to rouse the crowd and reveal SERA's secrets to the public, but that... our heroes didn't really stop them? It's just a wonder to me that our protagonist doesn't seem to be at all bothered by the end of the season by the fact that there's a company actively working on and making strides in time-travel technology with intentions of taking over the world and he's possibly the only one who can stop them, though understandably there was a lot on his mind I suppose.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]in the "original" timeline, Okabe does send a d-mail to Daru on accident, which immediately sends them to Attractor Field A timeline.

in the timeline before the Divergence, no d-mails are ever sent, but they're back in Attractor Field B where Kurisu is killed and WW3 happens and time travel is invented later on. Okabe saves Kurisu from being stabbed by making a convincing scene of her death (Okabe was very lucky here - Kurisu's circumstances of death were always the same here, so "faking" it allowed him to bypass her actual death), and instead Okabe is stabbed by her father (at least this is what i recall happening - the important thing is that Okabe is stabbed instead of Kurisu). This almost kills him, but they are able to use the time machine to go to Divergence where he recovers. but in this timeline, Okabe doesn't know Kurisu.

it's the future d-mail sent by future Okabe that indeed him and Daru pursue time travel in the dystopian future, which is where the time travelling machine came from (Suzuha even discovers' Daru's signature on it from the lab). but in that future, WW3 happens due to the asylum of Kurisu's father and the paper he was carrying. the whole reason they create a time machine is to send someone back in time to save the world from the timeline they are on.

The importance of the IBN 5100 has everything to do with SERN, though. again, what good would the ramblings of a goofball like Okabe trying to warn the world of impending doom by an organization that takes great strides in hiding its work from the public? Okabe and Daru make it a point to use the IBN 5100 to delete SERN's files on D-mails to prevent them from ever discovering the secrets of time travel. so yes, Okabe did try to stop them and in the end he succeeded. the burning of the paper that Kurisu's father had on the airplane also sealed the fate of SERN and the technology it documented, thus ending any threat of WW3.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]I found it silly how quickly they reached the conclusion that their friend always dying was a direct result of having changed the timeline, considering she seemed to do so whether it seemed directly related to their shenanigans or not. They hadn't ever reached this point in time without having sent any D-mails to have seen that she didn't die at that point anyway. Also, undoing a single D-mail which pushed it back a day wouldn't especially mean that continuing to undo unrelated ones would eventually save her, especially when IIRC he never tried to even send himself a new D-mail to avoid the situation for some reason, only kept jumping back.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]quickly? i'm not sure how you could have missed this from viewing, but Okabe had watched Mayuri die dozens of times in many different ways at some point, possibly even more than that as he frantically attempted to undo the past. for a long time he didn't even understand why it was happening, only that he had the power to go back in fucking time which is the best chance you could ever hope to stop something like that from happening. and the only reason Okabe ever got sent to Attractor Field A was because he sent a d-mail to Daru by accident via satellite in the 1st episode, thus sending the world from Field B to A.

Okabe finds out he can save her once he gets the Divergence Meter that tells him what world line he is on. Mayuri's death is the "convergence point" of Field A, no matter what he does while he is there Mayuri has to die. "Once this number goes above 1%, the world will change". Okabe eventually comes to the conclusion that this change is the inevitable fate of Mayuri, and he is correct. sending himself a D-mail in the past is exactly what he did, only many more years in the future. But this D-mail could only be "read" in the 2nd-to-last world line. It appeared as static in the first, if you recall.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]Considering they were able to hack SERN anyway, wouldn't it have been okay to have left some D-mails in place, ensure they got the old computer without undoing everything (which would be entirely possible regardless of what Christina said that one time) and then hacked away SERA's notifications on these? This is riding on the assumption that their friend wasn't destined to die simply because of any World Line shift taking place at all which, while this may have been the case, you'd think they could have at least attempted to give a shot considering the protagonist had basically resigned himself to undergoing indefinite retries anyway.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]remember that in certain timelines the IBN 5100 is broken, lost, stolen or simply missing. the only person who can ensure that the IBN 5100 makes it to Okabe is time traveling Suzuha/John Titor. she is the only person who for sure receives it in any given timeline. it doesn't matter how many D-mails they try to put in place to stop what happens in the beginning - Okabe's first d-mail was an unavoidable accident that alters the world line.

by sending more d-mails Okabe would have only sent himself further down the rabbit hole in Attractor Field A, thus making Mayuri's fate even more difficult to undo.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]A few points they glazed over included them never undoing the lottery D-mail which I assume was unimportant enough to have happened off-screen, or insignificant enough to have never shifted World Lines (like when they tried to rig the Hack's contest with Ferris*) (I can't remember if the protagonist felt a shift in World Lines after they first sent that message or not, before Riku arrived with the bad news).[/spoiler]

you are correct in that [spoiler]the lottery d-mail did not alter world lines, so there was no need to undo it[/spoiler]

[spoiler]Another thing was that the protagonist seemed to keep on being able to jump back two days in the past for the extent of the two weeks, including long before the machine that allowed him to do so was built. It's possible I've got this wrong because I was pretty tired when I was watching this, or it's possible that he passed on instructions to Christina on how to finish the device early. In case of the latter, I feel like they probably could have just brought it up once and then it would be implied for the rest if the jumps – for now it just feels like some detail is missing.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]as Okabe kept traveling he learned how to create the device faster and faster with the help Kurisu to the point where it's no longer necessary to show.[/spoiler]

[crackers]

stein's great

[Unless]

i'll humor you once again but i feel like you're just looking for things to not like about s;g so all of this is totally pointless. i'm not even sure you're reading my spoilers because you keep getting the names wrong.

It's understandable, but you obviously don't know me very well. If I didn't like the series, I wouldn't really care enough to be having this conversation, let alone have made a thread about it.

With regards to the names, I'm particularly bad at these anyway (seriously embarrassing at parties sometimes), but remembering Japanese ones outright doesn't happen with me and I usually pick up on who's being talked to by context, which usually isn't that hard. I could have watched this several times over and never picked up on Mayuri's portmanteau names like my friend pointed out to me.

oh my god.. do i really have to explain all this?

I think you're fundamentally misunderstanding a lot of my point, and I created a thread because I was interested in having a discussion on it. But if you feel like this isn't worth your time or this is doing nothing but annoy you for some reason, then you should probably just go ahead and stop posting already. Or don't. I'm not your mom.

[spoiler]The importance of the IBN 5100 has everything to do with SERN, though. again, what good would the ramblings of a goofball like Okabe trying to warn the world of impending doom by an organization that takes great strides in hiding its work from the public? Okabe and Daru make it a point to use the IBN 5100 to delete SERN's files on D-mails to prevent them from ever discovering the secrets of time travel. so yes, Okabe did try to stop them and in the end he succeeded.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]I wasn't looking for Okabe to warn everybody any build a resistance of sorts (for let's face it, in what sort of world would he successful in that?), rather to deal with SERN on his own. Deleting some files from a company's database when they have already succeeded in sending matter back in time and are dead-set on perfecting the science does not forever stop them from obtaining time travel.

They didn't even really mention this in the original aftermath of the season, but on the other hand the ending I've seen and the entire divergence plot never happened and I haven't watched the alternate ending yet, so maybe that has already been addressed for better than the credit I'm giving it.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]Okabe had watched Mayuri die dozens of times in many different ways at some point, possibly even more than that as he frantically attempted to undo the past. for a long time he didn't even understand why it was happening, only that he had the power to go back in fucking time which is the best chance you could ever hope to stop something like that from happening. and the only reason Okabe ever got sent to Attractor Field A was because he sent a d-mail to Daru by accident via satellite in the 1st episode, thus sending the world from Field B to A.

Okabe finds out he can save her once he gets the Divergence Meter that tells him what world line he is on. Mayuri's death is the "convergence point" of Field A, no matter what he does while he is there Mayuri has to die. "Once this number goes above 1%, the world will change". Okabe eventually comes to the conclusion that this change is the inevitable fate of Mayuri, and he is correct. sending himself a D-mail in the past is exactly what he did, only many more years in the future. But this D-mail could only be "read" in the 2nd-to-last world line. It appeared as static in the first, if you recall.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]Okabe is presented with a machine that tells his which percentage of change his world line is at, and had never once seen it before in his personal past (to have witnessed it being at a different percentage), which should go without saying is also not before he ever shifted world lines or sent any d-mails. John Titor tells him about what she knows of the machine and how it works but doesn't herself have any practical experience with it because she doesn't have any significant way of remembering world line shifts. The only reliable info she could have would have been gotten from a future iteration of Okabe that grew up in the world line that existed at that time (wherein Mayuri dies), who doesn't know for sure that the 1% turning point that occurred did so with Christina's death, or even that they have ever gone past 1% a world line change (because as I've said, Okabe never lived out the original timeline long enough to witness Mayuri not die at the points she normally does).

The only obvious way they could know for sure that the machine properly indicates when you shift past the 1% barrier, or that shifting past the 1% barrier would do anything to save Mayuri's life anyway, would be if it came from within a different 1% of world line shifts. This could be possible if Okabe had created it after already fixing his problem (having shifted to the world line where Mayuri is still alive), but at a much later point in time in his life. He'd have made it with the intention of giving it to his former self (with the use of the time machine Titor uses), the intention of which would be to also change his own personal experience of life to one wherein Mayuri hadn't died (as, at the point of his creating the machine, despite her being alive, his personal memory would have been of her dying and his growing older without her).

Based on the fact that Titor said absolutely nothing about anything like this, I'd assume it's fairly safe that nothing like that happened. So there's absolutely no proof that the turning point in world lines was with Christina's death, that changing this would save Mayuri's life, or even that such a thing exists.

Prior to this, Okabe had been using d-mails to fix every problem, and it seems silly that he'd completely ditch even trying to use them to solve Mayuri's death. This is especially true considering that sending d-mails which change the world line never changes Okabe's physical position in the world, so instead of running the risk of dealing with organised murderers over and over, he instead could have found somewhere safer and changed history from there. It also would mean less strain on his mind, which he admits could be at risk from how many times he's sending his thoughts back in time.

I don't not understand the conclusion he reached, or the fact that the show presents it as sacrosanct truth. I'm just calling bullshit. There are so many different conclusions he could have reached and instead he just clutches blindly at the straws Titor provides him. There're no more Hououin Kyoma 'mad scientist' moments where he just stares science in the face and slams down the lever, gods-be-damned. One could argue that for better or for worse, it's like the fight is taken out of him and he's compromised as a person. I would argue in counter that this is for worse.[/spoiler]

[rtil]

[spoiler]I wasn't looking for Okabe to warn everybody any build a resistance of sorts (for let's face it, in what sort of world would he successful in that?), rather to deal with SERN on his own. Deleting some files from a company's database when they have already succeeded in sending matter back in time and are dead-set on perfecting the science does not forever stop them from obtaining time travel.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]because Okabe discovered time travel before SERN. by SERN intercepting the message, they realize that time travel is possible and pursue Okabe and his lab members. SERN is only able to send matter back in time because of Okabe's work. when the world line is altered it is because of the d-mail interception, thus changing the past and the future.

by deleting the files, SERN is none the wiser and never discovers the secrets of time travel that Okabe happened upon.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]]Okabe is presented with a machine that tells his which percentage of change his world line is at, and had never once seen it before in his personal past (to have witnessed it being at a different percentage), which should go without saying is also not before he ever shifted world lines or sent any d-mails. John Titor tells him about what she knows of the machine and how it works but doesn't herself have any practical experience with it because she doesn't have any significant way of remembering world line shifts. The only reliable info she could have would have been gotten from a future iteration of Okabe that grew up in the world line that existed at that time (wherein Mayuri dies), who doesn't know for sure that the 1% turning point that occurred did so with Christina's death, or even that they have ever gone past 1% a world line change (because as I've said, Okabe never lived out the original timeline long enough to witness Mayuri not die at the points she normally does).

The only obvious way they could know for sure that the machine properly indicates when you shift past the 1% barrier, or that shifting past the 1% barrier would do anything to save Mayuri's life anyway, would be if it came from within a different 1% of world line shifts. This could be possible if Okabe had created it after already fixing his problem (having shifted to the world line where Mayuri is still alive), but at a much later point in time in his life. He'd have made it with the intention of giving it to his former self (with the use of the time machine Titor uses), the intention of which would be to also change his own personal experience of life to one wherein Mayuri hadn't died (as, at the point of his creating the machine, despite her being alive, his personal memory would have been of her dying and his growing older without her).

Based on the fact that Titor said absolutely nothing about anything like this, I'd assume it's fairly safe that nothing like that happened. So there's absolutely no proof that the turning point in world lines was with Christina's death, that changing this would save Mayuri's life, or even that such a thing exists.

Prior to this, Okabe had been using d-mails to fix every problem, and it seems silly that he'd completely ditch even trying to use them to solve Mayuri's death. This is especially true considering that sending d-mails which change the world line never changes Okabe's physical position in the world, so instead of running the risk of dealing with organised murderers over and over, he instead could have found somewhere safer and changed history from there. It also would mean less strain on his mind, which he admits could be at risk from how many times he's sending his thoughts back in time.

I don't not understand the conclusion he reached, or the fact that the show presents it as sacrosanct truth. I'm just calling bullshit. There are so many different conclusions he could have reached and instead he just clutches blindly at the straws Titor provides him. There're no more Hououin Kyoma 'mad scientist' moments where he just stares science in the face and slams down the lever, gods-be-damned. One could argue that for better or for worse, it's like the fight is taken out of him and he's compromised as a person. I would argue in counter that this is for worse.[/spoiler]

a couple things here..
[spoiler]

• i could be wrong about this because it has been a long time since the anime, but I am pretty sure Suzuha/John Titor was able to pass on the knowledge about the 1% barrier to Okabe, because that information is unchanging throughout world lines. what she couldn't know or remember is what the number on the Divergence Meter was in different world lines, because only Okabe has the ability to remember what changes in world lines with his "reading steiner" ability.
  
  
• the full functionality of the Divergence Meter is not entirely known, but what we do know is that Okabe was able to develop it with the help of the time travel thesis that Kurisu left behind. apparently there was enough knowledge there for him to deduce that there was a world line unaffected by either Attractor Fields, but it was still unknown what would happen there. still, it was his life goal to get there.
  
  
• Mayuri is not murdered in every alpha world line - she only has to die. even when he takes Mayuri to a safe place, she still dies on the same day, same time - whether it be by a freak accident or a heart attack, the end result is always the same. her death is unsolvable in this attractor field.
  
  
• the turning point in world lines is not with the deaths of Mayuri or Kurisu. these are merely things that must happen in their respective attractor fields. divergence only occurs when there is a large enough change in history to alter the attractor field. future Okabe learns this, and this is why Suzuha tells 2010 Okabe this. Okabe later realizes the big change is SERN intercepting the d-mail and discovering time travel.
  
  
• you are correct in that Okabe must blindly trust Suzuha and she could very well have been lying to him. but there were a lot of things she seemed to know that made it hard to imagine she could have made it all up. either way, in this instance, Okabe's trusting nature served him well, because Suzuha was actually an ally. but it still took a lot of guts for Okabe to go through with it. he took many risks using his time travel abilities to save everyone he cared about - all the while knowing that what happens in the divergence timeline is actually unknown. he even gets himself stabbed on purpose to save Kurisu and alter the beta world line, and would have died if not for the fact that the next place he traveled he was able to be treated. there really wasn't a point after episode 13 where he wasn't hinging his life on a thread of hope. he was essentially using himself as an experiment because he knew he was the only person who could save the world. how does that not make him a mad scientist? if he had no fight, he would have given up and accepted his fate in either attractor field. this actually happens in the VN. there are multiple endings where some of his friends end up dead and it seems he can't go on.

[/spoiler]

[Unless]

[spoiler]I wasn't looking for Okabe to warn everybody any build a resistance of sorts (for let's face it, in what sort of world would he successful in that?), rather to deal with SERN on his own. Deleting some files from a company's database when they have already succeeded in sending matter back in time and are dead-set on perfecting the science does not forever stop them from obtaining time travel.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]because Okabe discovered time travel before SERN. by SERN intercepting the message, they realize that time travel is possible and pursue Okabe and his lab members. SERN is only able to send matter back in time because of Okabe's work. when the world line is altered it is because of the d-mail interception, thus changing the past and the future.

by deleting the files, SERN is none the wiser and never discovers the secrets of time travel that Okabe happened upon.[/spoiler]

[spoiler]Oh. Well that would make an awful lot of sense. I'd assumed that the building of their machines (which would aid in their time-travelling endeavours) long before they intercepted the D-mail meant that this was something for which they'd already been striving for a while — and the interception was merely a kick-starter. Maybe in this alternate timeline (with the D-mails), they'd been receiving instructions from their future selves for a while, which was the only reason they'd been working on these machines for a while, and they hadn't been at all in the original one.

On the other hand I'm at the stage now where I'd rather rewatch before I talk in much more detail about it, because if I recall correctly, my memory isn't what it used to be. I suspect I'm sure to do so over Christmas, because this is exactly the sort of thing my younger brother would like, and I plan to burn him a DVD or something as an extra Christmas thingie.[/spoiler]

[rtil]

if you do re-watch it, check out the timeline from the game with all the different routes.

[Bamyasi]

Is reading this thread going to give me an Asperger's attack?

Unless's avatar already kinda is.

Anyway you should watch 2011's real AOTY now (if you haven't):