Steins;Gate - Ending Explained

The major twist of the series is that the first episode's events were actually the successful conclusion of the finale. The 'corpse' Okabe saw was actually a faked death—Kurisu was alive but unconscious in a pool of Okabe's own blood. The series finale reveals that 'future Okabe' (from the year 2025) realized that the only way to save Kurisu without causing a paradox was to 'deceive his past self' into believing she was dead, thereby triggering the 3-week journey that would eventually lead to the discovery of the Steins Gate world line. This reveals that the entire series is a stable time loop where the protagonist's suffering was a necessary catalyst for his own salvation.

One common interpretation is that the entire series is a meta-commentary on the player's experience in a visual novel, where Okabe's 'Reading Steiner' represents the player remembering previous 'save states' or failed routes. Another darker reading suggests that Okabe's mental state may be more fractured than it appears, and that his 'mad scientist' persona is a defense mechanism against the absolute solitude of being the only person who truly knows the history of the world. Some fans also interpret the 'Steins Gate' world line not as a perfect happy ending, but as a fragile truce with a universe that could still converge into tragedy at any moment.