10 Must-Try Time Travel Games For Sci-Fi Fans | Game Rant
At first glance, science fiction games often include futuristic settings, spaceships, and minimalist aesthetics. However, outside the popularity of Halo, Alien: Isolation, and even Star Wars: The Old Republic lie another untapped gem in sci-fi: time travel. And while time travel in itself can get tricky to implement in games, disrupting the space-time continuum would make for interesting stories.
Thankfully, some devs and creators already explored the potential of time travel in their sci-fi titles. Some gaming hits utilize time travel for their narrative potential - while others want to use time travel as gameplay itself. As a result, gamers have quite a roster of time travel games to look at should they fancy a compelling narrative.
10 Deathloop (2021)
Fans of Dishonored creators Arkane Studios would want to check out Deathloop in its September 2021 release. Despite being an upcoming game, Deathloop boasts a strong narrative that grounds its time travel mechanic. Essentially, the assassin Colt finds himself in a time loop during a mission in a mysterious island. His masked targets are in a seemingly never-ending party that "resets" during midnight. And Colt realizes he "resets" events himself during certain situations.
Gameplay-wise, Colt has to use a mixture of powers, gadgets, parkour, and stealth to take out all eight targets before midnight. The loop resets whenever Colt fails to kill all targets, or if he dies in the mission. Moreover, the game's multiplayer component allows the AI or other players to control Julianna - an agent tasked to protect the loop and interfere with Colt's mission.
9 Zeit Squared (2011)
Players who play Zeit Squared will see a rather ordinary shoot 'em up - basically, it's a lone ship versus aliens. However, despite being a side-scrolling shoot 'em up game, Zeit Squared also boasts a unique time travel mechanic.
Essentially, players can utilize a mechanic that enables their ship to move backwards and forwards in time. This allows them to "spawn" a shadow version that assists them in a level - be it through combining power and shots, or shooting various aspects of the map otherwise impossible for a lone ship.
8 The Misadventures Of P.B. Winterbottom (2010)
Players of The Misadventures Of P.B. Winterbottom will think of it as a greyscale, silent film with a simple platformer mechanic. It even has a straightforward story - the titular Winterbottom is just out to get pies.
However, behind its simple gameplay is an interesting mechanic. Winterbottom can manipulate time and have various clones repeat actions he's done. They can help solve puzzles, fetch pies, or even serve as platforms for the player's present Winterbottom. As a result, levels receive a more entertaining twist due to the game's accessible yet vastly flexible mechanics.
7 Singularity (2010)
It's one thing to strategically think about the impact of time travel, and another to use it to just rekt people. In Singularity, Captain Nathaniel Renko discovers the Time Manipulation Device while on a mission in Katorga-12, a mysterious island. Renko soon realizes that he can jump between the present and 1955 with the TMD - and becomes an integral plot mechanic.
However, the TMD itself becomes usable in the game. Players can use the device to move objects forwards and backwards in time, hold objects, and even unleash a stun or killing pulse. Thanks to the TMD, players now have more control over what happens specifically in a game's level.
6 Thinking With Time Machine (2014)
Players of Portal 2 can use the Thinking With Time Machine mod to mess up not just with space, but also time. In this mod, devs now give players a time machine device. With this machine, players can "record" movements and summon a double to perform these actions. Thanks to this new mechanic, the mod now introduces more instructions, concepts, and challenges for players to complete.
Aside from simultaneous actions or preemptive movement, the time machine mechanic can help in various things as well. For instance, time machines now allow players to jump on top of a crouching player in a previous instance. If the past player stands up from the crouch in the recorded instance, the present player gets to be lifted up by the copy.
5 Braid (2008)
Sci-fi fans will appreciate Braid for exploring various time travel tropes across popular media. Despite being an ordinary platformer, unique time travel mechanics per "world" gives a refreshing twist to the genre. In Braid, protagonist Tim needs to save a princess from an evil monster. At its core, Time can freely "rewind" actions and reverse time even at death. However, worlds have prevalent time travel mechanics that players can use.
In turn, Braid earns praise for its showcase of time travel concepts as game mechanics. At first, Tim can rewind time and have objects unaffected by the time manipulation. Soon, Tim's movements can literally advance or reverse time that affects enemy movement. Moreover, Tim can eventually cast a "time shadow" that does things he's done in the past, or even get an item that slows time around it.
4 Cursor*10 (2008)
With Cursor*10, players can get to play a one-player cooperative game. This browser title tasks players to click various objects on the screen and advance in levels throughout a time limit. When they reach the limit, they "repeat" the game - only this time, their original attempt is recreated, giving players more time to attempt the level they failed and advance further.
For instance, in the first attempt, player (as Cursor 1) got to click 30 boxes across four levels before the time ended. In the second attempt, players (as Cursor 2) will see Cursor 1 do the exact same attempt and earn score for Cursor 2. This means players can proceed past the fourth level to continue their progress - and this repeats with more "past" Cursors reappearing to assist the player.
3 5D Chess With Multiverse Time Travel (2020)
People consider Chess as one of the most celebrated strategy games of all time. Interestingly, 5D Chess With Multiverse Time Travel treats "all time" quite literally.
In 5D Chess, players now have a "multiverse time travel" mechanic that lets them move pieces much in the same way they can move through files and ranks. Essentially, as players move pieces between the "past," "present," and "future," they spawn new timelines or boards that have to be played.
Critics and players praise 5D Chess for its complex yet elegant usage of its time travel mechanics. A player turn is now composed of moving a piece across all timelines that exist. More importantly, players lose if they have less valid moves compared to the existing number of timelines.
2 Achron (2011)
In Achron's distant future, spacefaring Humans never got to discover faster-than-light travel until stumbling upon some alien ruins in the Remnant. Thanks to this alien teleportation technology, humans have begun colonizing various star systems within decades. Soon, aliens known as the Vecgir and Grekim wage war with Humans in a chaotic three-way for control of the Remnant system.
However, what perhaps makes Achron extremely notable is its categorization as a meta-strategy game. Thanks to the in-story "chronoporters," players now have the ability to transport troops or equipment to certain instances in time. This effectively allows players to wage war in the past, present, and future.
Gameplay touches upon various time travel concepts, such as the grandfather paradox. Moreover, a resource called chronoenergy allows players and AI to retroactively alter events in the past or anticipate future events.
1 The Legend Of Zelda: Majora's Mask (2000)
Gamers can credit Majora's Mask for introducing a darker take in the Zelda franchise. Link ends up in the parallel world of Termina, with its moon-bound to fall from the sky and end its existence in three days. Interestingly, sci-fi fans will love the return of Link's Ocarina. This time around, players can play melodies that lets them literally control the flow of time in the game.
The title imposes a three-day time limit before the world ends, which equates to 54 minutes of playtime. Link has to use the Ocarina to temporarily slow downtime in certain points, and find items to help him navigate the world map quickly. This unique usage of time earned Majora's Mask the prestige of being hailed as one of the best video games of all time.
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