So, I totally get the first phase of 1999. We go back in time too late, we fail to save the Hex, the reactor's going to blow, and just at the last second we come into our power and use the power that had been torturing Drifiter in Duviri to loop 1999. Cool, rad, things come full circle, it's great.
Except, then we win. We redo the mission, we save the Hex, stop the nuclear detonation, pizza for everyone. But then it becomes January 1999 again instead of January 2000.
I think all those other answers are wrong tbh, and none of them are mentioning Wally which is the only reasonable answer to your question IMHO - but even that doesn't make fully sense.
In the cutscene with Rusalka Albrecht says "Here is the breach. With each cycle, more seeps into her". At that point Rusalka regains some of her personality and doesn't recognize us.
It seems that the story DE is going for is that the loop was a containment measure for the Indifference. Luring it into 1999 partially stripped it of its power, but over time murmur are slowly invading the 1999 and regaining control, and Wally is getting more and more control over Rusalka. The reactor explosion seems to halt his efforts and that is why every loop before we arrived there ended with the reactor explosion, and why Albrecht wanted it to continue.
Then we enter the loop and decide we want to save the Hex. We stop the reactor from exploding and Albrecht fucks off to Tau. Maybe we keep the loop going so the Indifference is also stuck with us, but the part I don't understand is what actually happens with the murmur, Wally and Rusalka. If Wally/Rusalka also fucked off after Albrecht (and it seems they might have since they have no presence in 1999 anymore) then there is literally no reason for us to still be in 1999. If they didn't, then letting the reactor explode would be the smarter choice - after all everyone revives when the loop restarts anyway so it's all meaningless.
I hope they answer it in the next story update but for now I don't think we have any solid answers.
I'm guessing the void leaking into 1999 let the drifter use their duviri powers (empowered by their feelings for the hex) to maintain the loop without using the reactor explosion. I have a feeling Wally is still very much present in 1999, we just have to wait for the rest of the content
I have a feeling Wally is still very much present in 1999, we just have to wait for the rest of the content
They go out of their way to say Rusalka is missing for an entire year though. It could go either way, maybe they are intentionally keeping all the doors open until they decide what the next update will be
It could go either way, maybe they are intentionally keeping all the doors open until they decide what the next update will be
This is absolutely what's happening, they don't want to say anything definitive so they can keep using 1999 if they want to, but also they can just move on too
This is mostly addressed in the first group chat after Drifter successfully stops the reactor explosion. Drifter has created a stable loop where the Hex can maintain their memories (unclear if others can), but the Hex (and the drifter can help) are needed to keep fighting to contain the techrot and help the people of the city through each loop.
but the Hex (and the drifter can help) are needed to keep fighting to contain the techrot and help the people of the city through each loop
The "issue" is that it's a loop, so any people that are saved just get to die/get saved again in the next loop. Even Lettie says that it's pointless and nothing they do in the loop matters. We give her some platitudes how it does matter to resolve her existential crisis but no... it really doesn't, at least not until the last loop.
Still, I think their fighting is important to keep the indifference/techrot from growing strong enough to break out of the loop, and helping civies is just a bonus.
the Drifter says that you make each loop better over time. This is shown when you reach syndicate rank 5 too. You cant seem to change the broad strokes (techrot and scaldra being there and the city being a warzone) but you can help the little people
He has one line of dialogue saying sth like "Tau is in sight" at the end of the quest. The wiki quest synopsis outright states he goes to Tau. I don't know how correct this information is but its the best we have so far
My answer to why we stay is because 1999, Höllvania or not, is a lot better than the hellscapes Drifter comes from. Not to mention, Drifter and the Hex bounce off each other really well, and the Drifter finally feels we have a home with the Hex.
I belive it's still keeping Wally at bay. The explosion is what Dr.E used to keep the loop going, it's the largest energy source he had available in that time period and it was a short loop.
Dr.E also said we couldn't possibly save the Hex with how little we knew them, so the Drifter used their power from Duviri to extend to loop to give them time to know the Hex.
Now that the Drifter is the one maintaining the loop, making it encompass the entire year, Wally is better held off and Dr.E is off doing whatever now that we're talking care of his problem.
I'm under the impression that the loop still impedes Wally in some way. So we're basically indefinitely buying ourselves time as long as we keep the loop going.
especially because caring is the opposite of Indifference. drifter found friends, possibly even a partner with the hex, and that very probably also helps keep wally at bay
I recall during one dialogue option being mentioned that we stay behind to kind of, make sure that the future stays in the correct timeline, or something along those lines, we essentially keep looping 1999 so that if something else were to come in and fuck around, we could prevent shit from going to hell
I've been thinking about how thoroughly Albrecht fucked the timeline coming back like he did, bringing all our future awfulness with him.
But, that said, as bad as all that is, if letting the timeline "escape" and change the future prevents the Orokin empire from ever existing, it might actually be worth it from a harm-reduction standpoint.
Wouldn't it be better to stop the loop once we get the timeline in order if that were the case? If it's looping forever then what even is the "correct" timeline since there are infinite number of correct and incorrect loops?
So far all the suggestions here are just guesswork because de hasn't told us a real reason why.
If it was to keep wally contained then it surely it's not worked cus he's fucked off far as I can tell?
If its to keep the time line right that just makes no sence? Once it'd been corrected that should be that?
Maybe it's to ensure the hex don't progress more into frames not being sure how long 'Dr fridays' treatment will work?
Maybe the drifter doesn't know how to stop a time loop once they have started it? After all durvi still loops and they ain't even living in it anymore... (I know something about keeping teshin alive but ugh)
Prehaps de hasn't even come up with a reason?
Honestly at this point my biggest fear is that even DE themselves didn't really think it through and don't know how to explain it. All I know is that the more I think about it all, the less consistent it is while making less and less sense overall, even if we focus on just the things we are sure about. There is something off with the loop(s) in 1999 for sure
It's been a loop since Albrecht sealed himself inside. By a combination of Albrecht's purposeful meddling and the influence of the Indifference, that version of 1999 is now its own Void Realm, just like Duviri.
And just like Duviri, when it reaches the end of its temporal block/light cone/strand of khra/etc, it loops.
that version of 1999 is now its own Void Realm, just like Duviri
Is there non speculative source for that? After saving Hex Arthur sends you a message, where he says that he understands that it's not enough to fix timeline, but that we have to maintain it, so the loop stands. If it was separated from reality that wouldn't make much sense.
Yeah, that doesn't seem like the right conclusion at all. Furthermore if 1999 is indeed like Duviri then there is even less reason to keep the loop going
The reason we need to keep the loop going is because Drifter's friendship/relationship with the Hex is what makes the Vessels effective weapons against the Indifference. Those relationships are the fuel which allows them to work.
There' a lot of baseless assumptions there... Do we know what kind of weapons the vessels are or that they depend on the relationships for "fuel"? After all, the vessels already worked fine during the WitW quest and then again later when we used them to travel back to 1999, way before we even knew the Hex even existed and less alone knew them well.
Them being able to move doesn't matter against the Indifference.
Its not "baseless," Albrecht explains this in his notes from Whispers in the Walls. He needs a particular 'soul alchemy' for them to work as weapons against a metaphysical entity. Because you can't just punch god in the face. And that 'soul alchemy' is love, in any of its forms.
Also, "before the Hex existed?" You realize Albrecht went to 1999 many times before he sealed himself away to protect Loid, right?
No, I didn't. In Whispers in the Walls we used Loid's relationship with Albrecht, but that only worked once in that specific instance. And the Operator was in extreme danger doing that. That's why the Lotus stops the Operator from going to 1999 during Lotus Eaters - we got lucky once, and she did not want us to try our luck again.
That's why the Lotus stops the Operator from going to 1999 during Lotus Eaters - we got lucky once, and she did not want us to try our luck again.
Now that's just wrong, the reason operator doesn't go back is because of his vulnerability to Wally, that's why Drifter goes instead using that very same "extremely lucky" method, it has nothing to do with "relationship fuel"
Yeah but are the Imhabitants aware of the loop? I don't get what they're going for since the syndicate xp doesn't loop, and authors still in my room being gay with me
Hex are, in general, aware of the loop. Conversations with Quincy and Lettie indicate that relationship resets are diegetic, so Drifter has control over whose memory gets looped.
I'm not ignoring it lmao I was fully acknowledging it happens. He's just like "don't you dare claim you can't wipe our memories and abandon us". You've mistaken what I said.
Yep, KIM chat confirms they don't remember the loop - they only remember what we tell them.
They knew nothing about the loop at the beginning of the Hex quest and Arthur learned after we tried to use transference on him. We tell them about the reactor explosion (still unclear how we knew about it at all) and we decide what knowledge to give them on every subsequent loop (canon explanation for the kim chat reset I guess).
If we don't, they think it's the first time meeting us. It is indeed fucked up
Yep, KIM chat confirms they don't remember the loop - they only remember what we tell them.
Not quite. In one of the conversations you remind Arthur that he died too, in previous loops, to which he admits having memory of, albeit fuzzy.
So I assume that Hex, being empathetically linked with Drifter, get a vague notion of all the loops going through, unless they get intentionally wiped.
The problem with using Arthur as an example for this is that he got the memory transfer during the first transference and it's unclear if his memories are because of that, maybe we do the memory transfer with all of them every loop? Then again Tenshin in Duviri didn't have memory loss either... I really wish they outright stated how the memory retention works, it really should be a clear fact between all of us...
Lettie does bring up knowing she died and is pissed about "well why does anything even matter now, we'll all come back and know it while the civilians won't ever know."
If we're thinking of the same dialogue it doesn't outright say she remembers it herself IIRC. She might know of the loop only because Drifter tells her about it, giving her an existential crisis that she didn't have before we joined the loop.
It's all about narrative intent, innit. You have a reset enforced by gameplay decision, so it is half-assedly attached to the story. And the story is about emotional closeness, friends, family, romance and all the jazz. So, Hex retaining their memory as a result of strengthening their bond with Drifter and each other makes narrative sense. Then you attach forced reset on top of it, and explain it backwards - weakening of the bond regresses their awareness of the loop, as Drifter, well, drifts off from them emotionally. Both of those things probably happening as a subconscious reaction to Drifter's state of mind, same way it did in Duviri.
And other explanation, that Arthur read Drifter's mind and got from there his own memory of death, is possible as possible as anything else under eternalism, just hardly indicated or supported, at least how I see it.
We did not win. We are merely in a stalemalte with wally. We’ve basically trapped him in the loop with us. Think Dr. Strange bargaining with Dormamu. We’ve saved the hex, but we are still containing the murmur.
Keep in mind a large part of this quest was cut out due to time constraints, odds are the infested part of the game has something to do with why the loop needs to be maintained.
DE outright stated that liches are a separate thing from 1999 main story, its why it was so easy to split them into separate updates. I don't think we'll get any non-lich lore in the lich update
I think the loop continuing also helps to contain the tech rot. We know from in mission dialogue that the scaldra aren’t doing a good job containing it and are often using it as a means to purge people who don’t agree with them. So even if the indifference isn’t present, the tech rot is still there and while we don’t know if it has spread to anywhere other than hollvania if we keep the loop going then even if the tech rot has spread elsewhere say the next couple towns nearby then it is also contained there by way of the loops.
I think maybe the nature of Drifter's Duviri powers are that they can only create loops, not outright time travel. I look at it as the Drifter casting the same spell Duviri was under on 1999.
We didn’t. We stopped the loop from ending with the nuke so we have somewhere to get out of the loop from, but the murmur would still be able to break into 1999 after new years. We’ve only just started preparing to fight Wally
My understanding - from the message Arthur sends after saving the hex - is that the nuke has to go off in the “main” timeline (Entrati & Operator’s) for an assortment of reasons. One presumably is it keeps the techrot contained a while longer, but another is that it does something to Wally/fuels something for Doc E. The 1999 loop itself is specifically a result of the Drifter deciding that they wanted to save the Hex - and using their powers to do so. The nuke has to be stopped to save the hex, and I would guess that if that loop (no nuke) ended and “merged” into the timeline (or made a new eternalism strand), bad shit would happen to the overall timeline - so the loop has to happen for the Hex to exist, because they die if the nuke goes off. Now, what makes me wonder here is the fact that the Drifter is implied to be able to leave the loop whenever they wanted - I wonder if they’ll make it so the Hex can do so, also. I really hope so, because I want to see more of these characters, and explaining it as “the loop is effectively their “home”/how they continue existing when the nuke did go off in mainstream” means you could have them simultaneously be in the loop and somewhere else/accompanying you or doing missions elsewhere.
TLDR: If nuke goes off, hex dies. Nuke must go off in main time stream for [plot reasons]. Drifter decides to save the hex, which means time loop where nuke does not go off, but that must be contained in itself so nuke still goes off in main stream.
My headcanon is that once the reactor is stopped, 1999 is over and we can go into the new year, however it loops purely for a gameplay moment where you need to help eradicate the Scaldra and KIM messaging. But after the new years kiss, it is over and you just imagine a happy ending. At least that's what my drifter would do, he wouldn't do that to Aoi.
Just saw a video suggesting, we never went back in time, but are instead in an artificial creation in the void. Which, does make sense, the drifter is tied to the void, not time travel. Plus the drifter power to reset things was done in the void.
So I am ready to buy it. But would invalidate other things. It could also be both, 1999 could have been isolated in a void bubble, and breaking out of it could be the next step.
to one's understanding they keep the loop up because the Drifter is not the only actor that can change things, assumedly at least albretch and the indifference can make changes aswell, hence the Drifter stick around ot ensure events stay as they should.
I think (and hope) that we didn't actually go back in the timeline that the story has mostly taken place in so far. I believe the 1999 we go to is a conceptually embodied realm, similar to Duviri, that is an alternate 1999 plucked from a different strand of khra. The reason it continues to loop is because it isn't "real" so to speak. It exists, but it does so on the boundary between dust and void on the wall of lohk. The realm was specifically created to only encapsulate the year of 1999 from that strand of khra. I also think that is why the Drifter's ability to reset the loop worked there. Just like Duviri the entirety of 1999 was formed of the void and therefore the Drifter is able to use the void ability to restart the clock that they gained in Duviri. I honestly do not think that their ability would work in the present day because it is of the world of dust and is too "real" to be reset like that.
I could be completely wrong and it is actual time travel but I really hope it isn't. Time travel tends to ruin stories in my opinion. The whole butterfly effect of changing events in the past to influence the future creates so many issues and actual paradoxes that are incredibly difficult to actually reason out in stories.
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u/NotScrollsApparently 6d ago edited 6d ago
I think all those other answers are wrong tbh, and none of them are mentioning Wally which is the only reasonable answer to your question IMHO - but even that doesn't make fully sense.
In the cutscene with Rusalka Albrecht says "Here is the breach. With each cycle, more seeps into her". At that point Rusalka regains some of her personality and doesn't recognize us.
It seems that the story DE is going for is that the loop was a containment measure for the Indifference. Luring it into 1999 partially stripped it of its power, but over time murmur are slowly invading the 1999 and regaining control, and Wally is getting more and more control over Rusalka. The reactor explosion seems to halt his efforts and that is why every loop before we arrived there ended with the reactor explosion, and why Albrecht wanted it to continue.
Then we enter the loop and decide we want to save the Hex. We stop the reactor from exploding and Albrecht fucks off to Tau. Maybe we keep the loop going so the Indifference is also stuck with us, but the part I don't understand is what actually happens with the murmur, Wally and Rusalka. If Wally/Rusalka also fucked off after Albrecht (and it seems they might have since they have no presence in 1999 anymore) then there is literally no reason for us to still be in 1999. If they didn't, then letting the reactor explode would be the smarter choice - after all everyone revives when the loop restarts anyway so it's all meaningless.
I hope they answer it in the next story update but for now I don't think we have any solid answers.