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| The Game-Players of Titan | |
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 Cover of first edition (paperback) |
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| Author | Philip K. Dick |
| Cover artist | Jack Gaughan |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Science fiction novel |
| Publisher | Ace Books |
| Publication date | 1963 |
| Media type | Print (Hardcover & Paperback) |
| Pages | 191 pp |
| ISBN | NA |
The Game-Players of Titan is a 1963 science fiction novel by Philip K. Dick.
Plot summary
Pete Garden, the protagonist, is one of several residents in a depopulated, post-apocalyptic future world who own large swathes of property. These residents are organized in groups of regular competitors who play a board game ("Bluff"). These contestants (or "Bindmen") stake their property, marriages, and future status as eligible game players on its outcomes. Pete also experiences bipolar disorder, which may adversely affect his competence as a Game participant.
The Game is administered by amorphous, silicon-based aliens from Titan, Saturn's largest satellite. These creatures, known as the vugs, are obsessed with gambling. In addition, the Game's exogamy helps to promote human fertility after the devastation of global warfare, after satellite-borne "Henkel Radiation" weaponry from Red China sterilised much of the Earths population. The vug exert hegemony over Earth, but do not occupy it as such. Instead, it is visualised as a paternalistic relationship. Moreover, while the vugs are telepaths, they do not permit human telepathy or precognition within that arena of the Game. It is also the case that the vugs are involved within human society, using induced hallucination to maintain the semblance of human form.
At the beginning, Pete has lost his favourite property, Berkeley, and his wife, Freya. Moreover, Berkeley's new owner has sold it to a notoriously corrupt Bindman from the East Coast, Jerome Luckman. Pete misses Freya, and worries about the compatibility of his new wife. He is also attracted to Pat McClain, a mysteriously fertile woman living within his remaining property, as well as Mary Anne, her eighteen year-old daughter. Pat is a telepath, while her husband Allen is precognitive, and their daughter manifests telekinesis. These telepaths resent the fact that they are not allowed to participate in the Game, due to possible abuse of their abilities during the contest. Pete breaks off his tentative relationship with Pat when he discovers that his new wife, Carol, is pregnant- a rare occurrence in this largely infertile, depopulated world.
Luckman, the new owner of Berkeley, is murdered, and Pete is implicated, along with six other members of his group, Pretty Blue Fox. However, Pete and the other group members are suffering from induced amnesia, which leads to further vug/human police suspicions. Pete discovers that vugs are abusing their own psionic abilities to appear human. However, the vugs also have their own political factions, which further complicates matters. "Extremists" do favour subversion and conquest of Earth, while "moderates" favour the status quo of paternalistic collaboration. Fertile humans start an underground resistance versus the vugs, but they are replaced by vugs, posing as humans. Pretty Blue Fox syndicate members are teleported to Titan, and play a decisive Game with Titanian vug counterparts for the future of their two worlds.
Criticism
- Rossi, Umberto, “The Game of the Rat: A.E. Van Vogt’s 800-Words Rule and P.K. Dick’s The Game-Players of Titan”, Science-Fiction Studies #93, 31:2, July 2004, pp. 207-26.
External links
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