On Time Travel

DannyboyO1

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Oct 3, 2007
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Lesse... time travel... I'm thinking the middle child of the Enchanter series in the glory days of Infocom. Still wish I could have managed "Frotz Grue" in a useful sense. But anyway, the time travel was brief as heck. You travelled about... 10 minutes in the past. Due entirely to a predestination paradox. The time loop consisted of you swapping a couple items with your future self, and immediately crawling into a bit of cave to get at a time travel scroll that you promptly use to be on the other side of the time travel mechanic. And if you screw up at any point, you end the universe in total destruction of causality.

Another interesting sequence was Sorcery 101, a Legend game. There was an island where time ran backwards. This meant, in a primarily text game, that you were given the results of your action and were forced to type the command that should have resulted in it. It helps that you are basically doing the Goldilocks story and wind up spending the day guessing what you just did so you don't violate causality... and you get back on your boat hours before you arrived. So... you still have the day. Reminds me of a Stephen Wright joke.

Timequest is another oldie-but-goodie. One of the few text adventure games I played where I managed to win without actually acquiring any hints. I did, however, go through a couple sheets of notebook paper. Your task is to fix broken time. Some areas, you don't need to do anything. Some, you might be arranging meetings disrupted by the time villain. You win because he leaves you tied up in a room with a time portal going back about 10 minutes. So your older self appears, frees you, and shoves you through the other portal to free yourself...

That's it for the good ones not already mentioned. I know a bad one not covered, which featured jogging through a few time periods of simulated combat and doing battle with, basically, a virus taking over the world through an uncontained holodeck. Not a classic, and technically only simulating temporal travel.
 

Jared

The British Paladin
Jul 14, 2009
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That first message made me laugh so hard...but, I think when it comes to time travel, its really hard to try and make it work...when, we really dont know how it works itself.

I think, PoP has done it best in Sands of time...and, anything more than that is pretty much meh
 

ultimateownage

This name was cool in 2008.
Feb 11, 2009
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Uh, Yahtzee? Where the fuck's Timesplitters? So, you, you didn't include it? Well you have obviously never played the game, because any one who has would praise it for the best time travel game, and one of the best games, that has ever existed.
 

DannyboyO1

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Oct 3, 2007
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m64 said:
Perhaps that's not THE best game about time travel and my judgment is skewed by nostalgia, since this was one of the first games I played on PC, but considering probably no one else remembers it, here it goes - "Time Commando" by Adeline Software.

It was a really cool beat'em up/shooter and it's coolness was largely based on the time travel thing used as a plot device allowing designers to present player with extremely varied settings. Every two levels the game moved to a new epoch, with completely different backgrounds, enemies and weapons. Kind of like what Daikatana did without the bullshit talk. The epochs/settings covered were:
- Prehistory;
- Roman Empire;
- Feudal Japan;
- Medieval Times;
- Conquistador (one level on a ship, second in a Mayan/Aztec temple);
- Wild West;
- Modern Wars (one level during the First WW, second during modern 90's conflict);
- Future;
- Cyber Space (as a short final level).

Anyone else remembers it?
That's the one I couldn't remember the title to! Thanks. :)
 

geldonyetich

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Aug 2, 2006
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Yahtzee said:
Why not use the comments to discuss your favorite games with time travel premises, and which effectively use time travel as a gameplay mechanic?
You already know of one [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/view/zero-punctuation/203-Braid], at least the foremost I'd mention that makes good use of it.

There's also another one about stealing pies which is worth mentioning:


And, hey, lets not pan Majora's Mask too hard. Granted, the main time mechanic was "restart 3-day sequence from start" over and over again, but it was nonetheless a brilliant game.
 

BlueInkAlchemist

Ridiculously Awesome
Jun 4, 2008
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I am shocked at the lack of Chrono Trigger on this list.

Yahtzee Croshaw:
Time Travel Analogy: Like pumping helium at Abraham Lincoln during the Gettsyburg Address, basically just for a laugh.
True. But still. No Chrono Trigger?
 

ultimateownage

This name was cool in 2008.
Feb 11, 2009
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Irridium said:
Favorite game where Timesplitters is used as a game mechanic is Timesplitters Future Perfect. In every level you have to help yourself in some way. It got especially insane during the U-Genix level where you had 4 of you. 2 hacking into the systems and 2 defending the guys hacking.

It was fun.

Then again all of Timesplitters is awesome, so whatever.
I remember that level, the hacking was really annoying, and you had to do that bit 4 times has each version. But I was about 8 when I played it, so I was rubbish at it.
 

coldfrog

Can you feel around inside?
Dec 22, 2008
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One of my favorite games with time travel as a premise? Well, skipping the already mentioned obvious ones, I bet you might have forgotten that Radiant Silvergun involved time travel. No? You didn't forget? You never knew? No, you shouldn't have known... anyone who actually knows that has spent too much time looking up that kind of stuff.

Anyway, the game I played that best implemented time travel was almost certainly Braid. There are a couple flash games that I played as well that were utterly fantastic, but I can't really remember the names. I'll look that up sometime.

Thechessdragon said:
I personally loved a game for the gameboy advance called The Lost Vikings. It involved time travel, but more for the story. Actually only in the story.
That's actually a remake from the Genesis ;) Just gotta point it out cuz I'm that kind of guy. One of my faves as well.
 

Thomas Bambust

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Mar 16, 2010
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1. Future Perfect, one of the better time-travel games ever. It was a good game overall, had great multiplayer and an awesome, yet primer-confusing, plot.
2. Braid, ambitious, but flawed. Could've been a lot better, but did very good in the time-travel department.

The problem is that voluntary time travel is really hard to do on grand scale (notice how you never VOLUNTARILY go back 200 years? it always happens in cutscenes. In-game, 10 seconds is often the best you can manage.

So how about combining both of them?
 

Le_Lisra

norwegian cat
Jun 6, 2009
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SaintWaldo said:
Yahtzee Croshaw said:
You could even bring up Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask and no doubt gain the approval of Chris E.
I'd rather bring up Legend of Labia: Majora's Minora, because I'm quite sure Chris E. never played with that toy set.
You sir, win for silliest pun of the day. :)
 

Burningsok

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Jul 23, 2009
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Jack and Calumon said:
Chris E. is truly a great man. He sure put you in your place Yahtzee! Ha Ha Ha.... Bored now.

Calumon: Half Life 2 had a way of travelling forward in time.

Jack: You've never played it! How the bloody hell do you know?

Calumon: I'm made of data and copy your memories while you sleep.
Oh... Jack, be careful of what you dream of. There's no telling what Calumon will do 0_0
 

Jim15

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Jul 27, 2010
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Timesplitters 3 was a really good FPS time travel based game. There weren't really many mechanics for the time travel, it's just that the game never took itself too seriously and as a result ended up being really fun. Lots of content in single player to unlock, tons of characters to play as in multiplayer, and memorable characters just made it a great experience overall. I miss FPS games like that.
 

Thunderhorse31

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Apr 22, 2009
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TheGreenManalishi said:
I'd argue that Majora's Mask is time travel done perfectly, in that it isn't a gameplay mechanic so much as part of the environment that can be controlled on a game-wide scale.
Gee, I never would have guessed you'd feel that way, judging from your avatar. That said, I agree wholeheartedly.

Le_Lisra said:
SaintWaldo said:
Yahtzee Croshaw said:
You could even bring up Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask and no doubt gain the approval of Chris E.
I'd rather bring up Legend of Labia: Majora's Minora, because I'm quite sure Chris E. never played with that toy set.
You sir, win for silliest pun of the day. :)
That just might be the pun of the year, let alone today. But I agree, good show.

Damn I'm agreeable today. I don't know what's wrong with me...
take advantage while you can
 

dennett316

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Jun 30, 2010
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ultimateownage said:
Uh, Yahtzee? Where the fuck's Timesplitters? So, you, you didn't include it? Well you have obviously never played the game, because any one who has would praise it for the best time travel game, and one of the best games, that has ever existed.
It doesn't use Time Travel as a gameplay mechanic, merely a plot device....damn fine games though, the most fun I've had with multiplayer ever.
 

Knifewounds

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Nov 18, 2009
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One game that came to mind when you mention time as a "gameplay mechanic" is Cryostasis in which you can "penetrate another character's memory and change the actions taken by that character in the past" <---(wiki)to change history its self. Interesting premise to say the least however it is worth noting that the game got mixed reviews, but from my standpoint it was a fun, and relatively original game for me despite its flaws.
 

cauby

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Apr 27, 2010
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DannyboyO1 said:
m64 said:
Perhaps that's not THE best game about time travel and my judgment is skewed by nostalgia, since this was one of the first games I played on PC, but considering probably no one else remembers it, here it goes - "Time Commando" by Adeline Software.

It was a really cool beat'em up/shooter and it's coolness was largely based on the time travel thing used as a plot device allowing designers to present player with extremely varied settings. Every two levels the game moved to a new epoch, with completely different backgrounds, enemies and weapons. Kind of like what Daikatana did without the bullshit talk. The epochs/settings covered were:
- Prehistory;
- Roman Empire;
- Feudal Japan;
- Medieval Times;
- Conquistador (one level on a ship, second in a Mayan/Aztec temple);
- Wild West;
- Modern Wars (one level during the First WW, second during modern 90's conflict);
- Future;
- Cyber Space (as a short final level).

Anyone else remembers it?
That's the one I couldn't remember the title to! Thanks. :)
Another fan of Time Commando here.I used to play it a lot when I was a kid.It's really the first game that popped into my mind when yahtzee mentioned other time-traveling games.It didn't use time travel as a gameplay mechanic,but it was still great that in a single game you could use katanas,laser pistol,fight dragons,spaceman,lions (on the Coliseum).
 

maninahat

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Nov 8, 2007
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This would be one of his lazier articles this week.

My favourite time travel game so far would be in one episode during the second season of Sam & Max. Hilarious, clever, and the logic is a lot more straight foward than that of traditional point and click adventure games.
 

Drmonstereater

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Feb 5, 2010
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Wow, Chris E. really blew you out of the water. Better watch out, he might start writing counter arguments to ALL of your reviews.