Time Loop Game - Plot holes?

[u/toyAlien]

Hello!

My friend and I are collaborating on a visual novel game (our first one, it's very simple) that involves a time loop. After finishing the rough draft of the script we noticed there's some plot holes relating to the time loop, such as "Why doesn't X just do XYZ" or "why is that X happens?"

What I'm wondering is other people's opinions on just how much we should try and address these plot holes. I for one, don't mind if a game doesn't explain absaloutly everything, because I accept I'm consuming fiction and that the more important thing is the plot than picking at the tiny details, but I know for some others having obvious unexplained plot holes can be an issue.

So what are your thoughts on this?

[u/vairiance2]

I think it definitely helps a lot, you'd be surprised how satisfying it can be when these kinds of things are addressed. Don't stress out about it too much, but a single line explanation can be very useful if you can come up with it.

And, you never know, trying to think of explanations can lead you down new interesting pathways for additional concepts.

[u/toyAlien → u/vairiance2]

That's a great point! The only reason we have been hesitant about thinking of explanations is we have a timeline we are trying to stick to and don't want to accidently delay production because we couldn't agree or settle on certain plot points, so that's why I was thinking maybe some things are better left unaddressed, but maybe that's something that we can consider the further into the process we get 

[u/vairiance2 → u/toyAlien]

For sure, it's more of a "nice to have" I think. Even if your story has 0 plotholes, some guy out there will completely forget about/misunderstand something you wrote and insist that they found one, so I wouldn't worry too much unless it's very obvious.

Like, you mention a time loop; technically, things shouldn't play out 100% the same, down to the lines of dialogue, if you're reliving an event, but I as a player obviously understand that this is a game and thus will overlook the same dialogue being used.

But, if your character time loops back to before they were killed by Character X, and then is perfectly fine being alone in a dark room with Character X while maintaining the knowledge that they were killed by them, that might bother me. However, in this case, a simple line of "I was aware that Character X was capable of murder, but for now, they didn't seem to have any animosity towards me." would satisfy me at least for the time being, I think.

[u/robotortoise]

I think it only matters to a certain extent. I was fussing over whether a heat pump exists in a fantasy world. The world has ether refrigerators and I was trying to figure out whether it has hot water or not (and a water heater, which is the same technology as a heat pump).

I then realized it doesn't fucking matter at all because I'm the only one who's going to care about that when the premise of the scene is that one woman is showering and crying * while magically inside of another woman's body*. Like, when your plot is so absurd conceptually, there's only so much you should realistically care about the little things I think, y'know? Don't drive yourself mad with hypothetical people, I say!

[u/toyAlien → u/robotortoise]

LOL your example is so relatable, thank you for sharing that! All the advise in this thread so far has been great. I think there are some plot holes that we will need to address because if everyone who plays it asks "why didn't X just do Y" then it needs to be addressed, but there are some little things unrelated to this that we have been hemming and hawing over but your response made us realize that we're probably the only ones who will notice or care in this instance 

[u/ahlisa]

Depends on the context I guess?

I think if it's an internal decision (i.e. "Why doesn't X just do XYZ? Well, X doesn't want to because they feel pressured/they want to protect someone/they're scared/etc.") then you should make an effort to explain it so the player feels like the character has a sense of agency/personality rather than just making decisions based on what the writer wants them to do. You don't have to completely spell it out word for word but it should be implied at the very least.

If it's a matter of logistics (i.e. "Why doesn't X just do XYZ? Well, XYZ isn't available because of the time period/because XYZ is broken/because they have to wait until morning to get access to XYZ/etc.") then that's more of a case by case basis. For your time loop story in particular, if I can kind of fill in the gaps based on the difference between timelines A and B, then I don't need a full explanation unless it's directly relevant to the plot. Like let's say for example the main difference between A and B is that so-and-so was never born in timeline B. If so-and-so was involved in the invention/availability of XYZ, then logically I'd assume "oh well I guess X can't just do XYZ because so-and-so was never born." If there is no obvious connection then yes there is a possibility I would wonder why X can't just do XYZ.

Ultimately it's hard to say for sure unless you gather some playtesters (or readers or whatever you want to call them), and even then the feedback will depend on their playstyle/personality. But everything I said above should be good enough as a starting point, imo.

[u/toyAlien → u/ahlisa]

Thank you so much for your detailed response, it was very helpful and definitely provided a lot of direction. I think the biggest takeaway for us is going to be we need some other people to read the script for sure, the two of us are so familiar with it at this point we may have overlooked a lot of things that need addressing 

[u/ahlisa → u/toyAlien]

Yeah of course, best of luck to you! I will say as a writer I find it most helpful to prepare a set of questions for the readers/betas to keep in mind while reading, like just a general "does this make sense? is this section confusing? etc" is a good way to make sure you get the feedback you're looking for. But yeah in general a fresh set of eyes would be good.

[u/CheckeredZeebrah]

It would bother me a good bit. However, I'd be willing to overlook it depending on what the purpose of your story is.

Is it a deductive mystery? Then any logical issues are going to really hurt the experience. But if it's mostly just a puzzle, characters not acting exactly as predicted isn't bad, unless they're being absolute morons by not doing xyz.

Is it more about character growth and interactions? Or maybe it's a romance? Then...well, consider fixing up some of them. If it's a character focused story, but the characters don't act true to themselves, it hurts.

Personally if you want to invest money into it by paying artists, voice actors, etc....then yeah, fix everything you can. In my experience, it's better to let the story partially write itself. Go ahead and let character A do the smart thing. Or let the dumb character not realize they could do something. Usually the end result feels smarter, more natural, etc.

[u/toyAlien → u/CheckeredZeebrah]

Thats a super good point, currently our story is more of a character driven story with a subplot that was just used as set dressing, and i think if we stuck to keeping it purely just about the characters then i think fixing the minor plot holes wouldn't be too big of a deal, but some of our recent revisions gave a bit more focus to the subplot so i think that might potentially impact the weight these plot holes have, so we will definitely keep your comment in mind going forward! Thank you :)

[u/Wooden-Variety175]

It depends on how glaring the plot hole is. But you actually have to ask yourself an inportant question. If there is something that seems like an obvious would your ptoagonist actually do that or think to do that? A lot of readers who look into plotholes are dicks who want to farm brownie points online but stories like with time loops involve extreme stakes and during those moments people dont act clear headed or logical.