Okay, so maybe – just maybe I’m going out on a limb here – but hear me out a sec. I think PQube are going to publish Steins Gate on console in Europe – and this is why. So a couple of months back, I noticed on their twitter feed that they were talking about ‘Chicken Tenders’. Not exactly news worthy no – or rather, that’s what I’d have thought, if I hadn’t at that time, been re-watching the the anime.

Anyway, I didn’t really give it a second thought until this morning when I saw their latest tweet and then decided to back through their log. Turns out Chicken Tenders aren’t the only Steins;Gate references they’ve been throwing out there for the past two months. In fact, in between their bike-sim releases, the PQube channel has been randomly tweeting nothing other than Steins;Gate references for ages now, starting with;

*the feels*

So obvious.

Paranoid much.

This one is VERY obvious.

The favourite drink of Future Gadget Lab Member 001

The guy who runs the TV store downstairs has this on his Tee.

Again, a couple of obvious ones here… and then the rest of them. Some subtle, others not so.

Steins;Gate is second only to Evangelion for Cicadas 😉

That last one I can’t check as I don’t have the anime on my phone anymore. Anyone care to look – I’m guessing it’s significant? The first one directly references a quote from the Visual Novel as you can see here;

Lastly, looking at the PQube facebook page – there are a couple of references on there to Steins Gate as well;

This, of course, in reference to the IBN 5100 so central to the plot of Steins;Gate.

And again, another reference to the TV store below the Future Gadget Lab apartment.

yeah, because – LAB COATS.

Oh yeah, and one more thing – I did a little more searching around and I found that there’s an ‘Official’ Steins;Gate Community’ just started on Facebook – it’s only been active as of October – which is roughly when all the tweets started happening. And the last two posts on the page in particular are kind of telling.

Er… okay, maybe this one…

All in all I think that’s pretty compelling evidence that there’s something going on. Question is – will this just be a release of the PC version already released in the States, or will it be a PS3/PS Vita/360 console release? Or even next (current?)-gen? Given PQube aren’t known for their PC releases, and already have previous on Japanese releases like BlazBlue and European distribution on games like Senran Kagura and Arcana Heart, then I’d put money on it being for console.

If true, this is amazing news. Steins;Gate is a Visual Novel so high in quality – it’s a crime that it’s not more widely known. I have contacted PQube for direct comment on this – I will update on the Rice main page when I hear back from them.

UPDATE

So, since I last posted, there have been some updates to the whole Steins;Gate ‘thing’. Firstly the Official Facebook page has linked back to this article saying;

Also, the page has now updated it’s images so that it’s only showing images from the Visual Novel – and none from the anime…

This morning they also posted this to Twitter – which surely must be suggesting a format other than PC – so consoles/handheld/iOS/mobile basically.

Lastly, I contacted PQube to ask if they could give any clarification to all of the above and they sent me this picture;

I’ll leave you to draw any conclusions on this one yourself…