Steins;Gate is a 2009 science fiction visual novel game developed by 5pb. and Nitroplus. It is the second game in the Science Adventure series, following Chaos;Head. The story follows 18-year old Rintaro Okabe and his friends as they accidentally invent a form of time travel via text messages that can be sent to the past. The gameplay in Steins;Gate includes branching scenarios with courses of interaction.
Steins;Gate was released in Japan for the Xbox 360 in October 2009. The game was ported to Windows in August 2010, PlayStation Portable in June 2011, iOS in August 2011, PlayStation 3 in May 2012, PlayStation Vita in March 2013, and Android in June 2013. JAST USA released the PC version in North America in March 2014, both digitally and as a physical collector's edition, while PQube released the PS3 and Vita versions in North America and Europe in 2015. Additionally, the iOS version was released in English in September 2016. The game is described by the development team as a speculative science ADV.
A manga adaptation of the game, written by Yomi Sarachi, was serialized from 2009 to 2013, and later published in North America from 2015 to 2016. A second manga series, illustrated by Kenji Mizuta, began serialization in Mag Garden's Monthly Comic Blade in December 2009. An anime series adaptation by White Fox aired in Japan from April to September 2011, and has been licensed in North America by Funimation. An animated sequel film premiered in Japanese theaters in April 2013. A fan disc of the game, titled Steins;Gate: My Darling's Embrace, was released in June 2011. A non-canon 8-bit sequel to the game, titled Steins;Gate: Hen'i Kuukan no Octet (also known as Steins;Gate: Variant Space Octet and officially localized as Steins;Gate: Octet of Shifting Space), was released in October 2011. Another game, Steins;Gate: Linear Bounded Phenogram, was released in April 2013.
A follow-up game, Steins;Gate 0, was released in December 2015 for the PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4 and Vita; it received an anime adaptation in 2018. A remake of the original visual novel titled Steins;Gate Elite, which presents fully animated cutscenes from the Steins;Gate anime, was released for the PlayStation 4, PlayStation Vita, Nintendo Switch and Steam in 2019. Included as a bonus for the Nintendo Switch version, an entirely new game called 8-bit ADV Steins;Gate, in the style of Famicom adventure games from the 1980s, was released. Another remake, titled Steins;Gate RE:BOOT, was released on Steam in August 2026, with console releases planned for October 29 that year.
Gameplay
Steins;Gates gameplay requires little interaction from the player as most of the duration of the game is spent reading the text that appears on the screen, which represents either the dialogue between the various characters or the thoughts of the protagonist. Like many other visual novels, there are specific points in Steins;Gate where the user is given a choice to affect the direction of the game. For these decision points, Steins;Gate presents the user with the system. When the player receives a phone call, the player can choose to answer or ignore the call. Incoming text messages have specific words underlined and highlighted in blue, much like a hyperlink on a browser, which the player can select to reply to the text message. Most phone calls or text messages do not require a response, though there are certain points in the game where the player is required to take action. Depending on the player's choices of how to respond to these phone calls and text messages, the plot will progress in a specific direction.
Synopsis Setting and themes Steins;Gate is set in the summer of 2010, approximately one year after the events that took place in Chaos;Head, in Akihabara. Physical locales of Akihabara like the Radio Kaikan building can be spotted in the game. According to Chiyomaru Shikura, who headed the planning of Steins;Gate, Akihabara was chosen because it is an easy place for acquiring hardware parts, which makes it the ideal place for people interested in inventing and tinkering with things. The notion of time and time traveling are the main themes of the game. The concept of cause and effect is featured prominently in the game as the protagonist travels back in time numerous times to perform different actions in an attempt to alter what has happened in the future. Steins;Gate also features hard science fiction elements.
Characters
The player assumes the role of Rintaro Okabe, the protagonist of Steins;Gate. Okabe is an eccentric individual, a self-proclaimed mad scientist who often goes by the pseudonym . Mayuri and Daru call him , a portmanteau of his surname and given name. He is 18 years old and a first-year student at Tokyo Denki University, alongside being the founder of what he calls the in Akihabara, where he spends most of his time and has dubbed himself Lab Member No. 001 (as he is the first person to join). Okabe gives off the appearance of being delusional and paranoid, frequently referring to the "Organization" that is after him, talking to himself on his phone, and engaging in fits of maniacal laughter. He is frequently mocked for this behavior, mostly by Kurisu and Itaru, and referred to as a chunibyou, although as the story progresses, he mellows out and shows that deep down he is a kind-hearted and loyal friend, only playing up the Hououin Kyouma personality as both a form of entertainment and a way to guise his insecurities. As he experiments with time travel, he learns that he is the only one who possesses the ability to determine changes between different timelines, which he dubs "Reading Steiner"; the reasoning behind this is never explained in-universe, although it is implied that a fever he had as a child during the Y2K crisis had something to do with it.
Kurisu is the main heroine of the game and Lab Member No. 004. She is an 18-year-old neuroscience researcher at an American university who can speak and read English well. Having had her research published in the academic journal Science at this age, Kurisu is extremely talented. She had skipped a grade in the American school system. Okabe simply tends to call her or one of the several nicknames he comes up with, such as , "the Zombie", and "Celeb Sev", which bugs her to varying degrees. She is something of a mild tsundere, although she will object to it whenever someone (usually Itaru) calls her that. She does not get along with her father and has not spoken to him in many years. She posts on @chan (the game's in-universe version of 2channel) under the name "KuriGohan and Kamehameha"; the alias also makes a cameo on Kaito Yashio's PokeCom tablet in episode 9 of Robotics;Notes.
Mayuri is a long-time childhood best friend of Okabe and is a bit of an airhead, as well as Lab Member No. 002. Mayuri enjoys creating cosplay costumes and has a part-time job at a maid café called "MayQueen NyanNyan". She often calls herself , a portmanteau of her given name and surname, which is also what Itaru calls her. She has a distinctive sing-song way of speaking, and she typically sings when she arrives or introduces herself. Several years prior she lost her grandmother under unknown circumstances, and to prevent her from succumbing to grief, Okabe declared her his "hostage", his entire eccentric persona being for her sake. She is 16 years old and she is a second-year at a private university preparatory school.
Itaru is an experienced hacker who has known Okabe since high school and is Lab Member No. 003. He is very skilled in computer programming and with old and new computer hardware. He is also well-versed in things on otaku culture. Okabe and Mayuri refer to him by the nickname , a portmanteau of his given name and surname. Okabe sometimes also calls him , mispronouncing the word to his chagrin. He is 19 years old and, like Okabe, is a first-year student at Tokyo Denki University. He appears in Robotics;Notes as DaSH, and as a main character in its sequel, Robotics;Notes DaSH.
Moeka is a tech journalist searching for the IBN 5100 "retro PC", and is Lab Member No. 005. Moeka is extremely protective of her mobile phone and becomes agitated if someone tries to take it from her hands. She is very shy and prefers to talk to someone by sending them a text message instead of speaking, even if they are right in front of her. Okabe calls her . She is 20 years old.
Luka is a friend of Okabe and Lab Member No. 006. His appearance and mannerisms are quite feminine as a result of his upbringing. He is also a close friend and classmate of Mayuri, who often asks him to try on her cosplay costumes, but as he is quite shy, he generally refuses. Okabe calls him by a feminine nickname: ,Names ending in the character 子 (ko) are usually assigned to girls in Japanese. and thinks of Luka as his pupil. He is 16 years old. / Faris NyanNyan works at the maid cafe "MayQueen+Nyan²" (pronounced "Mayqueen Nyan Nyan"), the same maid cafe that Mayuri works at, and is the most popular waitress there, as well as Lab Member No. 007. Her real name is Akiha Rumiho. Her family owns Akihabara, and she was the driving force behind it becoming the city of moe and anime. She tends to add to her sentences. She is 17 years old.
Suzuha works part-time for the landlord of Okabe's apartment and is on a search for her father in Akihabara, and is Lab Member No. 008. She enjoys riding her bicycle and appears to be at odds with Kurisu for some reason. Later it is discovered that she is actually the time traveler known as John Titor, and the future daughter of Itaru, her real name being . She is 18 years old. She is the main protagonist of the side-story manga, Steins;Gate: Bōkan no Rebellion.
Yugo is Okabe's landlord, who owns a TV repair store beneath his apartment, living with his daughter, Nae. Okabe gives him the nickname "Mr. Braun" due to his passion for CRT TVs (known in Japan as "Braun-tube TVs"). He is usually rough and impatient, especially when interacting with Okabe, but acts dotingly over his daughter and his TVs. He is the protagonist of the side-story manga, Steins;Gate: Onshū no Braunian Motion.
Yugo's daughter who lives with him in the TV repair store and gets along well with Mayuri and Suzuha, but is afraid of Okabe. She later appears in Robotics;Notes as a member of JAXA.
Kurisu's father and the overarching antagonist of the series. His obsession to outshine his daughter in the field of science ends up leading into World War III. His real name is .
Plot True End route The following summary is based upon the True End route.