In 3 Body Problem, San-Ti provide a VR headset to humans with a game installed on it that helps them understand San-Ti, their world, and their situation.
The VR headset is one of the objects found on a dead scientist, a case that Clarence is looking into.
Jin later discovers a similar headset at Vera’s. Ye Wenjie claims that Vera had been playing a game in it before her death.
Jin wears the headset and finds herself in an ancient civilization. The game’s AI work and immersive world seem to have the technology from 100 years in the future.
San-Ti choose who plays the game and who doesn’t, as, at first, when Jack tries it, he is instantly killed by a character in the game.
Understanding the game
The game in its entirety requires the player to lead a civilization from a chaotic era to a stable era. A chaotic era wipes a civilization off the planet, whereas a stable era helps it thrive for years.
When Jin first enters the game, all by herself, she finds herself in Civilization 137. There, she meets the Count of the West and his follower. They will meet the emperor to offer their predictions about the chaotic and stable eras.
Jin witnesses Follower dehydrating and melting down when a chaotic era passes by. She sees Follower and others like her who have been dehydrated, rehydrating once their bodies are put in water, and returning to life once they are in a stable era.
The stable era doesn’t last long, and the civilization is wiped out because the predictions the Count made are just prophecies. Jin failed to convince the emperor to listen to her.
Jin and Jack team up to finish the game. However, they keep failing to save every civilization they meet.
Anyhow, the game keeps sending them to the next level because, at every level, they slowly start understanding the purpose of the game.
The problem and its solution
In level two, Jin and Jack figure out that the world they are in is part of a three-star system. If the planet they are on revolves around one of the suns in a stable orbit, they are in a stable era.
However, if one of the other suns snatches the planet away, they wander through the gravitational fields of all three suns and find themselves in a chaotic era.
Jin solves the problem, but it’s in level three that she realizes that they are not supposed to save the planet; they are supposed to save the people of the planet.
Being part of a three-star system, the planet is doomed. No computer can predict the behavior of the three bodies in space.
Every civilization is bound to end in chaos. The only way for the people of the planet to survive is to flee.
A recruitment tool
Clarence’s investigation into the VR headset reveals that the game has a retinal scanner, an oxygen meter, and a brain wave sensor.
It is collecting a heap of biometric data, and someone on the other end is watching Jin and Jack play it. Wade’s prediction that it’s a recruitment tool comes true, as it is later revealed that the game is being distributed by Mike Evans and Ye Wenjie.
Jack and Jin meet Tatiana and learn that the game is the true story of San-Ti, who live in a three-star system and are doomed to perish. All of their civilizations from the past have met the same end.
Their only way to survive is to flee the planet and find a new home. Now, they are on their way to Earth because they were invited to come here years ago.
The game has been used to help humans understand and feel for San-Ti, manipulating them into worshipping them, welcoming them to Earth, and helping them conquer it.
Also Read: San-Ti in 3 Body Problem explained