Attractor Field

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Lore & Background

The Alpha attractor field is defined by the fixed point of Mayuri's death in 2010, which must happen in any time line belonging to that field. The Beta attractor field is defined by the fixed point of Kurisu's death in 2010, and in this field time travel is not discovered. Between these two fields lies the Steins Gate world line, which is unaffected by their convergence points. The divergence meter measures the difference of a new time line from its original, set to 0% when it was created. Time lines that are minor variations on a greater reality course are minor branches on what is called a world line, meaning certain events are fixed points destined to happen in all branch time lines, unless divergence is enough to lead to another world line.

In Their Own Story

In Steins;Gate 0, the concept of attractor fields is central to the plot. The game begins with a scene similar to Steins;Gate's ending, where Suzuha traveled to August 21, 2010, using her time machine to get Okabe to prevent a time-travel arms race leading to World War III. To do this, he needs to stop Kurisu's father, Doctor Nakabachi, from killing Kurisu and bringing her time travel theories to Russia. Suzuha brings Okabe to the moment of the murder, July 28, 2010, but he accidentally kills Kurisu himself, seemingly due to world-line convergence. Upon returning to the present, Okabe refuses Suzuha's requests to try again, and develops post-traumatic stress disorder. Later, in the branch leading to the ending "Promised Rinascimento", Okabe rebuilds the PhoneWave to help an amnesiac woman identified as Kagari, who has had Kurisu's memories implanted by someone. This inadvertently transports him to 2036 during World War III. Although Okabe had been predetermined to die sometime in 2025, Daru circumvented it by implanting 2011 memory data, as Okabe's body was still alive. Inspired by this and determined to avert this future, Okabe returns to 2010, destroys the hard drive, erases Amadeus, and sends a D-RINE message to the past of this branch, telling himself to "deceive the world and tie the possibilities". The resulting world line is not shown.

Reader's Guide

The attractor field concept is explained through the setting of Steins;Gate. Time does not consist only of alternative time lines. Each time line is different, and the "unit measure" that defines this difference is called divergence. The detector to measure this is called a divergence meter which was set to 0% when it was created. When it travels into another time line, it measures the divergence (difference) of this new time line from its original. Time lines that are minor variations on a greater "reality/history course" are minor branches on what is called a world line, basically a whole series of connected time lines. This means certain events are fixed points, destined to happen in all branch time lines, unless divergence is enough to lead to another world line. On a greater scale is the idea of an attractor field, a larger scale version of a world line. One important fixed point in the story is Mayuri's death in 2010, which must happen in any time line belonging to the Alpha attractor field. To prevent Mayuri's death, Okabe needs to make a significant enough change to cause a shift from the Alpha attractor field to Beta, where instead Kurisu is destined to die in 2010 and in which time travel is not discovered. Between the Alpha and Beta attractor fields lies the Steins Gate world line, unaffected by their convergence points. Some people can retain memories from the previous time lines after a shift, Okabe in particular possessing a very strong effect. He calls it Reading Steiner.

Did You Know?

• The divergence meter was set to 0% when it was created.
• Mayuri's death in 2010 is a fixed point in any time line belonging to the Alpha attractor field.
• Kurisu's death in 2010 is a fixed point in the Beta attractor field, where time travel is not discovered.
• Okabe's ability to retain memories from previous time lines after a shift is called Reading Steiner.
• In the 'Promised Rinascimento' ending, Okabe sends a D-RINE message telling himself to 'deceive the world and tie the possibilities'.