The objectives of the YUKIDOH Plan are:
- The rescue of Mayuzumi and the other victims of Flight 18’s crash.
- To seize “SELF” in this time-space plane, and confine it.
But the first objective was added later in the plot and the plan developed with time.
Development of the Yukidoh Plan
The Chronology of Remember 11 outlines the development of the Yukidoh Plan. According to it, Satoru’s plan began in 2009 after the Awazumi incident confirmed his belief in Self. His plan at that point was to lure Self to their world to take revenge on it for killing Sayaka. That same year, Satoru reveals his plan to Enomoto.
In March 2010, they begin their project using Leiblich’s quantum teleportation equipment. On January 18th, 2011, Satoru was planning on testing the teleporter in Australia to acquire some data (hence the airplane ticket under his mattress). Their theory says that to transfer regions over a long period of time, the teleportation region should have a large radius. Since Japan is too narrow to perform these teleportation without attracting attention, they chose Australia instead.
On January 17, just before his flight, Satoru learns about the Flight 18 crash and Yuni, the sole survivor. He also learns that Mayuzumi died. Satoru alters his plan to also save Mayuzumi from the crash using the space-time transfers. He cancels his plans to Australia and sets Mount Akakura as one of the transfers zones.
Satoru reaches out to Yuni to learn more about the incident, and manages to obtain the Terabyte Disc. Using the disc, he completes the space-time transfer equipment. The transfer sites are set in Japan. The goal of the plan is to rescue Mayuzumi and the crash victims, and to confine Self in their space-time plane.
Satoru manages to convince Yuni to join his plan and completes the setup of Hotarubi Mine. During July 2011, they operate the space-time transfer equipment. After the transfers are complete, Satoru and Enomoto perform a small scale transfer to exchange bodies. Finally, on January 11, 2012, Satoru returns the terabyte disc to Yuni’s room so that it can be moved back to 2011 after 7 days.
Infinity loop
The way that Satoru confines Self — a transcendental being — is by trapping it in an infinitely repeating loop.
The true form of the infinity loop is the never-ending story of Remember 11. The player/Self tries to hunt for answers, to discover a third route that doesn’t exist, to discover why things are happening the way they are. Going through the 33 endings, trying all the choices, but never becoming satisfied with the answer. It has no ending, and the player’s desire to solve the mystery keeps them trapped in it.
Kokoro’s actions affect Satoru’s route, and Satoru’s actions affect Kokoro’s route. When you take different actions, you create worlds that all slightly differ from each other (TIP 087: parallel worlds), and the story continues on forever like a spiral. The spiral has no beginning and no end. All the player can do is continue along the spiral and proceed in the infinity loop.
This story has not finished yet.
Truth is not revealed.
And it circulates through an incident.
It is an infinity loop!
Escape from the Loop
Despite that, there are a few times when Self successfully manages to escape the infinite loop:
- Utsumi’s Plan Execution End (Ending #23) – Utsumi kills Inubushi and herself. Satoru is transported to a mental asylum after losing his mind. A similar ending occurs in Peace of Mind, Alone in the Shelter Cabin End (Ending #32) and Annihilation End; Kokoro (Ending #33) when Satoru finds that Kokoro and the cabin members have died.
- Genocide of the SPHIA Residents End (Ending #4) – After Utsumi takes revenge on Inubushi, Kokoro finds herself back in the crash site on January 11th. A similar ending occurs in Alone in the Shelter; Disaster End (Ending #18) where after Satoru is killed on Day 6 or 7, Kokoro returns to January 11th.
With the first set of endings, [ORE] exits the loop by being held in a mental asylum.
The second set of endings is much more interesting. Why does Kokoro travel back in time to January 11th? The reason is because the causal loop is broken and a paradox is created. With Satoru dead, Yuni no longer returns to 2011 and the terabyte disc cannot be used to devise the Yukidoh Plan. Since the Yukidoh plan does not exist, the crash survivors are not saved by Yuni and they perish at the crash site.
Despite escaping the loop, Self keeps returning to re-experience the events thinking “this is a bad end, let me try again”.
TL;DR
Satoru seeks revenge for his sister’s death, so he tries to kill Self. But Self is an abstract entity that lies beyond their grasp. His plan exploits the idea that “curiosity killed the cat”, trapping Self in an infinite loop as it searches for the truth. That is the YUKIDOH Plan and the meaning behind the incomplete ending of Remember 11. The ending is intentionally abrupt and unsatisfactory, designed to punish the player for the power they exert over their world.
Finally, the plan seeks to save the crash victims, particularly Mayuzumi Lin.
Remember11 EXPLAINED 
That is so meta
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Wild theory:
After replaying the game recently, I wonder if the plan was about something else originally.
The final game might have came out as incomplete due to development process, thus leaving some players with an ending that can’t satisfy their curiosity but is it really a story about revenge?
Yukidoh’s personality in tips is described as someone who cares deeply about select few while being ruthless to other. Yes, Yukidoh hates SELF. But when one considers immediate results of his actions, it seems that the plan could have been one of saving as well. And by saving I don’t mean saving Mayuzumi but Sayaka.
The plan to rescue Lin came abruptly (since you can find ticket for Australia in Yukidoh’s room) and the relay point has to be place placed in a perfect time to ensure the transference of space. Since the device allowing this miracle to happen existed primarily in late 2011, and Sayaka died 2001, the last hypothetical transfer point would have to be somewhere in 2021-ish. Also, that phenomena allows for time travel as future Yuni as well as Kokoro’s team at the end of the game are able to move between 2011 and 2012.
The game raises many question as to how it’s possible for Kokoro and others to escape death despite the fact that their bodies are identified in the past. Maybe the whole point is to move Sayaka out of 2001 and save her in the same fashion.
So the decision to save Mayuzumi, might have been a test run of sorts, to ensure that Yukidoh will be able to trick SELF and save Sayaka that way in the process with the same trick. During drama cd, Yukidoh mentions that the best way to get back at others is by doing your best after all.
This is why, Satoru finding his way to the third area introduces a lot of problems for Yukidoh as well as it hints to him what he has to do to ensure his success. Yukidoh is shocked when Satoru introduces himself as “Yukidoh Satoru,” giving him an idea to switch consciousness with Enomoto. Yukidoh is also disappointed in lack of Satoru’s understanding of things, giving him another hint that in order for Satoru to succeed he needs to part not just his body but also many of his memories (which is most likely later reinforced by future Yuni). And most of all Yukidoh is shocked to hear that the body of Yukidoh wounded up dead.
It raises a question if in the end Yukidoh wasn’t played by SELF. Yes, his test run was successful but the person who would want to save Sayaka is now gone (for all we know), replaced by Satoru. “In order to gain something, you have to lose something.”
There are things that seems to be set up to maybe allude to this, like all questions about SELF, Kagome Kagome, the fact that Sayaka and Yukidoh were twins just like the Kali’s children and also there is an issue of Inubushi and Sayaka being voiced by the same people and having DID (more or than later, although it’s questionable in case of Inubushi after the drama CDs). There is also another issue. Yuni meets Alice before 2012. More about her later.
What can’t be ruled out is that, since the SPHIA-cabin-third location loop doesn’t appear to have a start and the end, it’s possible that the loop for saving Sayaka already happened. Maybe Inubushi is the result of those action. Sayaka would originally have DID but because of Yukidoh’s trap for SELF she end up merging into a single entity being Inubushi, wounding up in the past one way or the other until she kills Kali’s child in 2009, continuing the loop, leaving SELF victorious as everything still plays out the way it wants even though Yukidoh believes in his autonomous decisions and actions.
Coming back to Alice, she also shares voice with Inubushi and Sayaka. Yuni is surprised to hear her age, but maybe the body she is occupying is older while she is still a 10 year old. Kokoro and Satoru’s voices matched their consciousness, both in dialogue and recordings, so the reason why Alice sound like a child is not because she is a DID personality based on a child but the actual child.
Maybe even the fact that Sayaka has DID is already evidence of her being part of the consciousness trading phenomenon.
It’s also possible that there is more than 3-way transfer going on regarding Sayaka. We don’t know the location where Sayaka died (to my knowledge), we know more or less where the phenomenon device is located but Yukidoh was going to Australia? It raises interesting question how it relates to Enomoto’s explanation of bending the space axis.
Sorry I wrote it in a messy way, I am not a writer.
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I do see the potential for it to be a story about saving Sayaka, but I don’t recall anything that directly hints at it. On the other hand, we have tons of evidence for the revenge story. I’m not disagreeing with you, I just have no idea what saving Sayaka entails. I’m pretty sure she “died” in a hospital owned by Leiblich, but that’s not really a known location.
I did have a theory related to Australia the involves Sayaka. The chronology says that the amount of time traveled is proportional to the distance between points (look up the words “timeslip period” and “teleportation range”). The distance between Mount Akakura and Aosagi Island is nearly 550km and results in a 1 year travel. The distance between Japan and the Australian outback is about 6050km and would result in an 11 year travel. The midpoint can be Palau or another island. That 11 year travel could theoretically save Sayaka and line up with his Australia trip.
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