...themes.

It's becoming apparent to me that all the good storytelling these days (well, not all, but lots) comes from differing versions of playing with time. Time has drama, confusion, and it makes you think when you mix around with it.
Here's my timeline (please don't comment on any potential "puns")
Star Trek
Back to the Future
New Sci-fi stories, such as Star Trek TNG
Now games like Prince of Persia: Sands of time.
Anyone who's been following Star Trek: ENterprise, can see that Time is a huge drama factor.
Ok..dangit I realize theres alot of star trek here...but seriously.
Look at like Pulp Fiction. No time travel, but it plays with time.
Look at memento.

Now I"m playing Prince of Persia: Warrior within. This game is probably the most satisfying game in terms of time and confusion I've played, a very unique and almsot difficult to understand story. Theres alot to explain... (you'd have to play the game, I won't spoil anything save there is time travel, other than the usual dagger-backwards in time-so-you-don't-mess-up-again time travel).

Seriously though, you hear stuff like "All stories these days are used up or recycled, make an original story. It appears to me that the original stories these days are coming from different uses of time to create drama.

Someday someone is going to make a ovie where time is very very freaking confusing. constant time travel, tryin to change things, or something like that, that will be more confusing than the ones made now, and there will be a "Time" era of stories, where story after story is about time. Heck, we might be there now...but one day all those stories will eventually be recycled.

Do we need a new original theme other than "time" or other scientific / sci-fi ideas?

Just my thoughts.

Perhaps we're being prepared by some shady government organization for REAL time travel that is about to be unleashed on the world.

I blame HG Wells.

Well I thought this would be an interesting topic for discussion, but I guess it's not all that popular.

You're forgetting Half-Life. And the most confusing movie I've ever seen with regards to time is Frequency. It just.. makes no sense! If some guy wrote on the wood one generation ago, it wouldn't just appear before the eyes of the guy years later.. it would have already been there... argh!!

Of course, the ultimate use of time as a plot device would be the Bill and Ted movies. "After our report, we'll go back in time and set up a tape recorder...excellent!"

(And trust me...I am in no way belittling the greatness of the Bill and Ted films.)

Saw this porn with time travel once...


Something about "cavehos"... can't remember.

its called non-linear narritive.

its been around for ages.

From what I've seen and read, the time travel in PoP:WW (haven't played it, yet), seems very similar to the time traveling and realm-shifting in the Legacy of Kain/Soul Reaver games.

i.e. the same chamber looks different in different eras/material realms, requiring you to use both to progress for instance where a bridge would be collapsed in the future or pillars knocked over?

You should definately give the Soul Reaver series a whirl if you want more of the same.