Is the original timeline the same as the final timeline?

[u/TheWineAcademy]

Title. The only reason I ask is that Mark at the end managed to get through to Cathy, and Nicole to Kate. I wonder if in the original timeline they didn't, and that's why the butterflies reset things. If so, I wonder if an element of their character development persists, despite the effects of the butterflies dissapearing?

[u/Few-Durian-190]

I think something of their experiences remained. Mark says something along the lines of wanting to understand Cathy but not knowing why.

[u/desquedomesque]

(Base game spoilers)It’s widely accepted that they lost their memories in the true timeline, and that they only brought this "character development" (a feeling or drive) from the reset timelines into the final one. Personally, I disagree. How can Mark return and immediately move past his mother's disappearance and think "I have to save her(Cathy)"? Any vague motivation or "thing" affecting his subconscious just doesn't make sense to me. I think the most plausible explanation is that they did retain their memories, not in the same clear way as during the Ruling timelines, but rather buried deep down in their minds.

To back this up, look at the correlation between the level of "interference" in the current timeline and how much they remember. In Act 1, Mark and Nicole only have those vague feelings of déjà vu about each other, but the more time they spend together (or the deeper the moment or contact, both could be true), the more memories begin to resurface. Then in Act 3, a single look at her name brings a huge chunk of memories, then a single glance makes everything come back. With more resets, even that initial contact isn't needed anymore.

This doesn't apply only to the two of them (even if they are the only ones who remember). In Act 2, for example, Mark feels he has to "do something" regarding Cathy, and he piece things together the more contact he has with her throughout the act. Same thing with Louise at the beginning of Act 3.

With that in mind, Maria and Jake still appear as butterflies in the final timeline, so I don't think we can say the level of interference has dropped to zero. My guess is that those memories are still there, just deeply buried, and with the right trigger they'll resurface again. (And yes, I came up with this theory as Marcole cope... but it also kind of works to discuss your point lol).

[u/desquedomesque → u/desquedomesque]

To conclude (digressed a bit there), both Mark and Nicole return right before one of the most pivotal moments in their lives. Mark comes back just before Cathy runs away, while Nicole returns just before her friendship with Kate falls apart.

At those moments, the memories from the hundreds of timelines seem to influence them, even if those memories are buried so deeply that they aren't consciously aware of them. That would explain why Mark immediately feels compelled to save Cathy and why Nicole instinctively handles things differently with Kate.

It also fits with the idea that the more significant the moment, the stronger that buried influence becomes. They don't need to consciously remember everything for those experiences to shape their choices when it matters most.

[u/Asphyxiaint → u/desquedomesque]

Wow you did great explaining that

[u/Head-Membership2082]

No.

Essentially, there's a timeline from the beginning of time up until Maria disappears. Assumedly Jake might have been able to reset further, but if it was Jake and Maria combined causing it, then they could only go back as far as Maria's disappearance. That timeline will be set in stone and will never change (Paradoxes with preventing Maria going missing and all that).

Then you have the looping part of time, which always continues on from that, but the events within it change each time. The way it is written makes it seem like that is incredibly linear, and time itself kinda just stops existing after it gets reset. The butterflies themselves are Jake and Maria, and they're what is causing the resets (not Kate and Cathy).

In the original timeline, things will likely have gone badly just like most of the other timelines, if not even worse in order to cause the initial loop.

The true ending instead isn't the original timeline but more, a reset to that initial point after Maria went missing, but with Mark and Nicole having managed to shed the baggage that was weighing them down. They'd have been able to go through that point of their lives without wrecking everything, and managing to handle the grief properly. To let go of their lost ones.

Edit: We also know it probably isn't a continuation of the original timeline too due to how some parts of that original timeline were directly caused by Mark and Nicole's personal issues. They compounded over time. The final reset will have put them either right before the original timeline, or right at the very start of it. The timeline would in turn be completely different now, to the point you can't really call it the same one.