I finished it the other day and have thoughts on the worldbuilding and themes!
The basic premise is that in the future, time travel is possible! As you might imagine, unfettered access to time travel is somewhat dangerous, and after some bad times, it's decided that time travel has to be more strictly regulated. Which basically means you put in a request which goes via a board who decides if your request is approved or not (people and events are given timeline importance ratings and if they're high, you're not touching it) - and if it's approved, you pay a fuckton of money and gallivant off with a time travel agent who accompanies you to your goal. Since there's a ton of time travel, the world is constantly shifting and Chronozen agents basically exist outside of that, remembering what has happened without timeline shifting affecting their memories. People and items are shifted in and out of existence (if x doesn't meet and marry y, then all their descendants no longer exist). Shops and news constantly chronoshift. Some of them are plot relevant and some aren't: like there's a constantly chronoshifting news item about a war which is mostly irrelevant, but it goes through one country winning, the other country winning, a ceasefire... There's no protection for changes made and things can just be overwritten by someone else's later time travel. Collateral damage can happen: hey, look, we did your request, sorry that guy died 30 years before he was supposed to. It's really a fascinating look at how a world with massive time travel could actually really suck.
As for the agents, it's a kind of shitty existence in both minor and major ways. You have an awesome family? They could be shifted out of existence. Or you could be shifted into a history where you have a family and yet you don't know about them or who they are. There's these little threads on the computer where the Chronozen agents can chat that really just exist for worldbuilding reasons, but you've got problems like "I just brought this great tech then the company got shifted out of existence so it doesn't exist any more" or "I'm trying to read this biography but it keeps chronoshifting as his history changes" and nearly always ends with "just don't anything that's not chronolocked or you'll be really disappointed". They're basically married to their job as there's no real existence outside of it. You exist outside of the world with no real permanence as nothing around you is permanent. Then there's the client in the first chapter (which is not particularly long), who just wants to save someone, but his request was declined as he's too important to request as if they lived his life may have changed, and not have done the amazing advancements in Science he provided. (Why does someone else get to decide that those advancements are more important than a life, he says.)
I just really dug the worldbuilding and concept. The protagonist comes to care for someone over the course of the game, and in a world where nothing can truly be permanent as it can instantly be wiped out of existence, it changes her and her outlook on things. I just really enjoyed it and I wasn't sure I was going to - although I am a big Wadjet Eye fan, so perhaps I shouldn't be surprised.
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The basic premise is that in the future, time travel is possible! As you might imagine, unfettered access to time travel is somewhat dangerous, and after some bad times, it's decided that time travel has to be more strictly regulated. Which basically means you put in a request which goes via a board who decides if your request is approved or not (people and events are given timeline importance ratings and if they're high, you're not touching it) - and if it's approved, you pay a fuckton of money and gallivant off with a time travel agent who accompanies you to your goal. Since there's a ton of time travel, the world is constantly shifting and Chronozen agents basically exist outside of that, remembering what has happened without timeline shifting affecting their memories. People and items are shifted in and out of existence (if x doesn't meet and marry y, then all their descendants no longer exist). Shops and news constantly chronoshift. Some of them are plot relevant and some aren't: like there's a constantly chronoshifting news item about a war which is mostly irrelevant, but it goes through one country winning, the other country winning, a ceasefire... There's no protection for changes made and things can just be overwritten by someone else's later time travel. Collateral damage can happen: hey, look, we did your request, sorry that guy died 30 years before he was supposed to. It's really a fascinating look at how a world with massive time travel could actually really suck.
As for the agents, it's a kind of shitty existence in both minor and major ways. You have an awesome family? They could be shifted out of existence. Or you could be shifted into a history where you have a family and yet you don't know about them or who they are. There's these little threads on the computer where the Chronozen agents can chat that really just exist for worldbuilding reasons, but you've got problems like "I just brought this great tech then the company got shifted out of existence so it doesn't exist any more" or "I'm trying to read this biography but it keeps chronoshifting as his history changes" and nearly always ends with "just don't anything that's not chronolocked or you'll be really disappointed". They're basically married to their job as there's no real existence outside of it. You exist outside of the world with no real permanence as nothing around you is permanent. Then there's the client in the first chapter (which is not particularly long), who just wants to save someone, but his request was declined as he's too important to request as if they lived his life may have changed, and not have done the amazing advancements in Science he provided. (Why does someone else get to decide that those advancements are more important than a life, he says.)
I just really dug the worldbuilding and concept. The protagonist comes to care for someone over the course of the game, and in a world where nothing can truly be permanent as it can instantly be wiped out of existence, it changes her and her outlook on things. I just really enjoyed it and I wasn't sure I was going to - although I am a big Wadjet Eye fan, so perhaps I shouldn't be surprised.
Also, you can see the breakdown potential. :P
-timydamonkey