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Quantum Break Unmarked Spoiler Thread
- Thread starter SmartWaffles
- Start date
I hope that's where the second one starts. That would be boss.
Zvonimir Boban
Banned
When Hatch turned up in the epilogue, so fucking good.
I don't know where to start. I really liked the bits that explained how some stuff happend in the first place. How the taxi got there; why the machine has been activated hours before by someone etc.
Edit:
Also: "I'll come back for you." We know that the past can't be changed.
Edit2: End of Time(where both Paul and Beth landed) is scheduled for 2021. It will happen then, not sooner. All Jack and Will did with the CFR was to stop the fracture in time. Hatch's goal is to create a world for shifters, so he will trigger the End of Time somehow in 2021. At the end of the game he wants to recruit Jack, but why? Jack thinks that he saved the world for now. Why should he do anything? He could spend some good times with his brother.
Edit:
Also: "I'll come back for you." We know that the past can't be changed.
Edit2: End of Time(where both Paul and Beth landed) is scheduled for 2021. It will happen then, not sooner. All Jack and Will did with the CFR was to stop the fracture in time. Hatch's goal is to create a world for shifters, so he will trigger the End of Time somehow in 2021. At the end of the game he wants to recruit Jack, but why? Jack thinks that he saved the world for now. Why should he do anything? He could spend some good times with his brother.
Yeah, act 5 really brought everything home for me, so we'll done...
Zvonimir Boban
Banned
If Jack has contracted the same illness that Paul had, then Hatch can tempt him with treatments or help teach Jack how to control being a shifter.
This is the issue with every time travel story. Take "current Serene" for example. He uses the time machine to escape Monarch lead by future Serene. He travels to the past, a does exactly what future Serene had done. During his journey, he encounters Future Beth, kills her, and uses her Future Monarch equipment to jump start Current Monarch's research. So current Monarch couldn't exist as it is, unless Future Monarch existed, previously.
The existence of Monarch in the present, is dependent on the events of the future already occurring.
So in essence, there is no 'timeline' only a infinite time loop.
Are you sure about that? I don't remember the note
Ascenion
Member
Ran through the game again. I still can't understand why Paul didn't see the truth. He saw the end of time in 2021. Knows for a fact that is when it is supposed to start. Beth does too, but in 2010 never mentions that. How didn't Paul realize 2016 was a fluke? I'm starting to think time in this operates on set/fixed points like Doctor Who where things have to happen at this time period but how they happen can be variable to a degree. This is how I think Beth will be saved, she doesn't have to die 2010. Paul just has to get the CFR and Beth has to prompt William to make it.
Yeah, makes sense.
As soon as the first machine was activated 2016 Paul got out of it. Everything was set in time from there on.
Probably a wave of chronon particles that went through time and "played"/"set" all the events that would happen after that first activation.
SEGAvangelist
Member
Yeah this could totally become some dark apprentice shit with the promise that Beth can be saved or something.
In a sense, there really is no such thing as a past, or future. The concepts are interdependent.
When these characters speak of going back in time and trying to change events history, yet actually causing these events to take place, what they are failing to realize, is that it was a future version of themselves, that caused these events in the first place.
For example, I believe that when Beth says she tried to save Jack's parents, but ended up causing their deaths, it means that it was always a Future Beth that caused their death.
It seems like everyone in the game is afraid to break the loop for fear of what will happen to them in the continuum or the continuum itself. Instead they try to use there knowledge of the past to influence the future... But it won't work, because the future is also the past.
Somewhere along the line, someone is going to have to do something in the past, that they know didn't happen in their timeline...
When these characters speak of going back in time and trying to change events history, yet actually causing these events to take place, what they are failing to realize, is that it was a future version of themselves, that caused these events in the first place.
For example, I believe that when Beth says she tried to save Jack's parents, but ended up causing their deaths, it means that it was always a Future Beth that caused their death.
It seems like everyone in the game is afraid to break the loop for fear of what will happen to them in the continuum or the continuum itself. Instead they try to use there knowledge of the past to influence the future... But it won't work, because the future is also the past.
Somewhere along the line, someone is going to have to do something in the past, that they know didn't happen in their timeline...
Paul had a good idea with the lifeboat, but ultimately I sided with Jack's actions. Purely because I see the endgame being to save Will. To solve the problem of time ending, you would probably need the creator of the time machine and not a colony of hacks who don't even know about second breakfast.
They set up a lot for the sequel like naturally occurring time travel ala the cave that turned Hatch into a shifter. I'm glad they didn't have any fights with full-blown shifters, leaves a sense of mystery to explore down the road.
They set up a lot for the sequel like naturally occurring time travel ala the cave that turned Hatch into a shifter. I'm glad they didn't have any fights with full-blown shifters, leaves a sense of mystery to explore down the road.
Vinterbird
Member
Ideally, Hatch would convince Jack that End of Time will happen, no matter what happens and the only viable option is the dunk the world in Chronon energy, ushering in a new human/Shifter race.
Setting up a ideology war against William and Jack, and their beliefs on how to handle End of Time, with William understanding that Paul actually had a sensible plan.
Man, just finished the game, what a journey!
A few questions: what happened to that cemetery trailer that Jack is mourning his brother and a bunch of monarch soldiers appear? Does it appear in a junction I didn't pick?
I really thought we would eventually see the end of time, got really interested in that game of cat and mouse Beth and Paul were doing with each other.
Great game, makes me wanting more of it, hope Remedy makes a sequel or some DLC.
A few questions: what happened to that cemetery trailer that Jack is mourning his brother and a bunch of monarch soldiers appear? Does it appear in a junction I didn't pick?
I really thought we would eventually see the end of time, got really interested in that game of cat and mouse Beth and Paul were doing with each other.
Great game, makes me wanting more of it, hope Remedy makes a sequel or some DLC.
Bornstellar
Member
The feels when Jack watches Beth get executed 6 years in the past.
Bornstellar
Member
GungriffonEX
Member
Beth was exposed to massive amounts of Chronon at the ground zero event in 2010. Could that have turned her into the Shifter? meaning she could have survived getting shot. Could that have been her wrecking Monarch HQ near the end?
That Dude John
Member
Would be interesting if the next game was about becoming a shifter and the seemingly OP things that might let you do gameplay-wise.
Alandrus Sun
Banned
What he said. Every thing we've seen in the game shows that the past cannot be altered. Beth armed with her notebook from her future self did everything she could to stop those events from happening and yet they still occurred. She even tried to stop 9/11, twice, and yet each time failed because the "past" is set. Thus, so far we have no evidence that "breaking the loop" is possible and if it can be what the implications would be.
Think about it. Beth "thinks" she tried to change the past. But all she did was do exactly what future versions of herself had already done. She litterally did nothing different. It's the same with Paul Serene.
For example:
Paul and Jack are together as kids, and they see a homeless person fall to his death. Paul grows up and travels back in time. While there, he tries to save this man from falling. He startles the man, and the man falls to his death, right in front of young Paul and Jack.
What Paul fails to realize is that what he witnessed as a kid was the result of Future Paul causing the man to fall. It's all a continuous loop. So when he grew up, he unknowingly did exactly what Future Paul had already done. Like a self fulfilling prophecy.
I don't think anyone in the game realizes it, but they actually aren't doing things differently.
No one is actually even trying to do anything different. For example, what's stopping Paul from going back in time, and shooting the younger version of himself in the head instead of trying to save the homeless man? It's because his current existence is dependent on the younger version of himself growing up and using the time machine.
For example:
Paul and Jack are together as kids, and they see a homeless person fall to his death. Paul grows up and travels back in time. While there, he tries to save this man from falling. He startles the man, and the man falls to his death, right in front of young Paul and Jack.
What Paul fails to realize is that what he witnessed as a kid was the result of Future Paul causing the man to fall. It's all a continuous loop. So when he grew up, he unknowingly did exactly what Future Paul had already done. Like a self fulfilling prophecy.
I don't think anyone in the game realizes it, but they actually aren't doing things differently.
No one is actually even trying to do anything different. For example, what's stopping Paul from going back in time, and shooting the younger version of himself in the head instead of trying to save the homeless man? It's because his current existence is dependent on the younger version of himself growing up and using the time machine.
no, paul definitely knows this.
Paul knows it eventually, but only after he tries to change things. The Paul that initially goes back in time at the creation of the fracture learns it through trial and error.
No one actually knows this at a time in their life when they could use it to do something totally different.
Another example:
Beth goes back in time and wait's 11 years for Jack to join her. While she's there she tries to save Jack's parents, but ends up causing them to die. At this point, she must realize that it was Future Beth who cause them to die in the first place.
In 2010 Jack reads her journal and learns that Beth's attempts to save his parents lead to their deaths.
In act 5, we learn that Future Jack came across Beth during a stutter BEFORE she went back in time. what would happen if , during that stutter, he wrote an entry in her Journal that told her that trying to save his parents would lead to their death.
Doing so would actually change history, because the Journal that Beth gives to her younger self, would actually be altered from how Jack saw it in 2010
Okay, so I've been trying to build a timeline of events in my head and ran into a huge question right at the very beginning:
When was the first time travel?
The core was first activated in 1999, but nobody travelled at that date.
Do we get to learn whether or not young Paul Serene reaches the end of time (where he meets Beth) through time travel? If so, when did he travel to 2021?
Also, in Act 5, Will warns Jack that he can't simply repair the fracture, since that would cause a time paradox - but we obviously already have a causal loop. There clearly is the paradox of Beth being alive in 2016 ('past-Beth') while being killed in 2010 ('future-Beth'). We practically have three time machines (Will's 1999 machine, Monarch's 2016 machine and the one-time CFR time travel).
Isn't the CFR's pure existence proof that future events can be altered after all? I've thought about this for too long, nothing makes sense anymore....
When was the first time travel?
The core was first activated in 1999, but nobody travelled at that date.
Do we get to learn whether or not young Paul Serene reaches the end of time (where he meets Beth) through time travel? If so, when did he travel to 2021?
Also, in Act 5, Will warns Jack that he can't simply repair the fracture, since that would cause a time paradox - but we obviously already have a causal loop. There clearly is the paradox of Beth being alive in 2016 ('past-Beth') while being killed in 2010 ('future-Beth'). We practically have three time machines (Will's 1999 machine, Monarch's 2016 machine and the one-time CFR time travel).
Isn't the CFR's pure existence proof that future events can be altered after all? I've thought about this for too long, nothing makes sense anymore....
Here is a good timeline i believe.
http://www.entertainmentbuddha.com/quantum-breaks-time-travel-plot-explained-in-chronological-order/
Zvonimir Boban
Banned
The Beth alive in 2016 hasn't been killed yet, there's no paradox there.
There is no first time travel. Because their isn't a time line, but rather a time loop. The future is also the past.
There is no paradox, the Beth from 2016, goes back in time and dies in 2010. Meanwhile, 2010 Beth lives until 2016, then goes back in time, and ends up dying on 2010, meanwhile...
That Dude John
Member
Must be infinitely frustrating for someone who can see into alternate futures to also feel like ultimately he can't change it in a grand sense.
This one's great, thanks!
I think the closed loop thing is actually what Remedy wants us to think. If you think about it, there are already two futures. One where Amy is killed and the other where Amy is alive. Nick knows nothing of time travel and Nick knows a lot of things about time travel. Which one of these futures is going to be in "QB2"?
There are certain events that are seemingly "can't be changed" based off of those stories on what they tell us, but they also state that in order to kill a "shifter" you have to kill all of the permutations of that shifter's "life" or something like that (a reason why Hatch was able to come back at the end by going back into the "infinite").
Yes, the inevitability of the end of time can occur but it could occur in a certain number of permuations of a timeline as we see the game can take different routes. So basically there are branching timelines which invalidates that everything is of a single timeline which Remedy wants you to believe. It also gives Jack a possibility of saving Beth. Granted he could just find out how Hatch does his thing and give it to Beth to come back.
Mind blowing when you think about it that way.
There are certain events that are seemingly "can't be changed" based off of those stories on what they tell us, but they also state that in order to kill a "shifter" you have to kill all of the permutations of that shifter's "life" or something like that (a reason why Hatch was able to come back at the end by going back into the "infinite").
Yes, the inevitability of the end of time can occur but it could occur in a certain number of permuations of a timeline as we see the game can take different routes. So basically there are branching timelines which invalidates that everything is of a single timeline which Remedy wants you to believe. It also gives Jack a possibility of saving Beth. Granted he could just find out how Hatch does his thing and give it to Beth to come back.
Mind blowing when you think about it that way.
I don't think there are really 2 futures, rather whatever Paul chooses in your game is actually what happened every single time in that continuum.
He doesn't actually have a choice, only the perception of choice.
The only way to actually impact the future would be to cause something that you know happened, not to happen. I think in QB2 Jack will cause 2016 Beth to survive her 2010 encounter with Serene, which will actually break the continuum... With a potentially apocalyptic outcome. That's why Will warns against doing such things in act 5.
AdamMcKraken
Member
I really hoped we cna infinitely replay the game after finishing it, like they could have mad a transition where at the end of the game you can choose to end the story or go back to the beginning as kind of a newgame+. Would had been nice that when replaying Jack would sometimes note that he has a dejavu feeling.
You sure? What will happen then is that it always had to happen like this. She could be alive and hiding somewhere right now; similar to the Will-situation. He was thought to be dead, but he was already rescued by Jack then.
This is one of the more interesting things about Quantum Break, honestly. The nature of Shifters' existence implies a multi world theory governing the universe whereas the plot spends a lot of time refuting that interpretation. Is the future set? Can the past be changed? It's an open question.
If I had to guess, zero state (The End of Time) operates on multi-world and the world as we know if operates on single world. This is why Shifters have a lot of trouble operating on our plane; their existence is about multiple possibilities whereas our plane is about a singular, unchangeable possibility. However, our brains are conditioned to think we have free will, so the irrefutable breaking of this illusion can drive someone insane. See: Serene, Beth, Hatch.
The game does make it at least somewhat clear that Monarch doesn't necessarily know what they're talking about. Will is less than impressed by what they think they know in Act 5 because all they've done is reverse engineer his inventions and substitute that for knowledge of their development and the theories behind it.
No, because we saw her die. Jack saw the bullet enter her head.
Will was never dead, he was always rescued by a Future Jack. Current Jack just thought he was dead. Paul killed her. It's an e
If jack finds a way to keep that bullet from entering Beth's head, then he fill have effectively changed the course of history.
The point I'm making is, of all the people who actually travelled back in time, none actually tried anything different. All they did was repeat things that had already been done.
The idea that they "can't" do different things, is speculation, because they haven't actually gone back with knowledge of what their future selves have done; so they end up repeating the actions of their future selves.
What paul and will both do is suggest that can't be done because it shouldn't be done. For example, Had paul opted not to enter the time machine after seeing himself walk out of it. But, that would have turned his existance into a paradox. He could have killed his past self in 1999 to stop the fracture, but the same paradox would exist.
Alandrus Sun
Banned
We still don't know a lot about how time travel works but characters like Paul and Beth have tried in vain to change events in the past but were unable to, this goes beyond merely causing said event. Like I said Beth tried to stop 9/11 twice, once as she lived through it as her younger self armed with her notebook and then again as her older self when she was transported back to 1999. However, no matter what she tried she could not stop 9/11 from happening. Paul could try to kill himself in the past but it's likely that something would occur that would stop that from happening.
Remedy so far wants us to believe that the past is set but we still don't have a clear picture as to how everything unfolds do to the nature of the Junction Points and Shifters.
This is exactly my point. They are putting that point of the past is set in your head deliberately but also show decisions still change the future of the past in which one hasn't seen experienced the outcome.
Its not that something would stop Paul from successfully killing himself. It's that if future Paul kills past Paul, then his past Paul's killer would never have existed. It's a paradox with unknown circumstances.
If something did stop him, that means that he always tried to kill himself and was always stopped in the exact same way, every time.
Again, when Beth and Paul went back in time, they had no idea what their future selves had done in the past. So when they went into the past, in trying to change it, they repeated exactly what their future selves had already done.
The child Paul saw a man fall to his death because future Paul startled him. he grew up not knowing that Future Paul caused this man to die. So when he goes into the past, and tries to save the man, he ends up startling him and causing him to fall. It's a self fulfilling prophecy. He learned through trial and error, that he wasn't actually changing anything, merely walking in his own footsteps.
The only way to change the future would be if someone from the future forced something to be different.
when Jack says he's going to "come back" for Beth, he's specifically suggesting that he wants to change the course of history.
Alandrus Sun
Banned
But, that is what I'm getting at the game suggests that it simply is not possible to alter history. We at the end of the game are left with this nagging question of whether we actually did change anything or simply followed the natural progression of events as they were always meant to happen. We just don't know at the moment.
When I say that Paul cannot go back and kill his past self I'm not simply talking about it failing one time, I'm saying that no matter what he tries it will never work. If you've watched that Hulu show 11.22.63 then it would be like the "past fighting back," as in that show. The gun will jam or misfire, a car will jump right out in from of him preventing him from getting to his past self, a tree will suddenly fall down, a phone line will be cut, etc. No matter what he tries any attempt to alter the past will be thwarted and events will continue as they always have.
Now, again we do not know for sure if that is the case but at the moment we don't have any concrete information that suggest altering the past is possible.