The Pacific Counterpunch
While John Carmack sat hunched over his laptop, utterly absorbed in the project proposal, Yoo Jae-won endured his own stretch of taut nerves. To him, the creation of The Pacific was nothing less than a devastating counterpunch against a Japan sliding toward historical distortion and right-wing revisionism. He could not possibly reveal that truth to Carmack. The proposal therefore had to speak only of curiosity and pure, unadulterated fun as a game—nothing more.
A colossal scale that would encompass every major battle of the Pacific War beginning at Pearl Harbor. Graphics that would surpass the current generation and serve as the flagship launch title for Xbox 2. Revolutionary gameplay systems tailored for a hyper-realistic FPS. The document had to read like the definitive proposal it was. Because of that, Yoo Jae-won had poured nearly half a day—yesterday afternoon straight through until evening—into crafting the design document for The Pacific.
The references from numerous games stored inside his Memory Palace had helped enormously, yet none were identical, so he had labored with exceptional care. When the positive verdict finally came, Yoo Jae-won’s face lit up and he clenched his fist in triumph.
“Looks like it’ll be an interesting challenge.”
Once John Carmack gave his approval, the game was as good as finished. The Pacific strayed far from the style of any title ID Software had ever released, yet that very distance had ignited something in Carmack. Doom and Quake were masterpieces, but the quiet hunger to create something different had long slumbered in a corner of his soul. The Pacific struck that desire like a tuning fork.
Three specific promises had shaken Carmack most of all.
The first was its role as Xbox 2’s launch title, bundled by default with every console purchase.
“Single-player will run twelve to fifteen hours, with multiplayer included as a matter of course. We’ll also integrate an encyclopedia system linked to collectibles.”
Those collectibles would appear in hidden locations throughout the campaign—intelligence documents, artifacts—rewarding thorough exploration. Players who simply barreled down the critical path would miss the painstakingly crafted content. By deliberately stoking the collector’s instinct, the game would ensure they discovered everything hidden beneath the surface.
“It will likely become the largest and most spectacular game in ID Software’s history. The budget will be the highest we’ve ever committed.”
The second promise was a production budget to match that epic scale—two hundred million dollars. Ever since 3D had become the standard, game budgets had climbed into the stratosphere. True AAA status now demanded tens of millions at minimum. The 2000s had seen the first hundred-million-dollar titles; Doom 3 kicked the door open, and EA’s Medal of Honor followed. The age of scrappy developers winning with clever ideas was over. Capital had become king.
In that climate, Yoo Jae-won had allocated a full two hundred million to The Pacific. Even Carmack, veteran of several blockbusters, had found the figure staggering at first, yet the proposal justified every dollar. Realistic weapon and vehicle sound libraries, an actual orchestra for the score—these were baseline requirements. Cinematic trailers and in-game cinematics would leverage ID Entertainment’s renowned CG team to the fullest.
Though the software and entertainment CG teams were essentially family, ID Group’s internal policy mandated pricing internal transactions at rates comparable to real outsourcing. The more cinematics used, the higher the cost, and the proposal called for over thirty minutes of them.
“Finally, I will personally participate in The Pacific’s development.”
Yoo Jae-won’s declaration carried the greatest weight of all. Carmack knew the terrifying caliber of the man’s programming ability; this promise eclipsed every other assurance. With Yoo Jae-won’s direct involvement, the ID Tech Engine itself would ascend to an entirely new plane—he had no doubt.
“Yes! This time, let’s create a legend!”
The two men shook hands. Within that firm bond of trust, The Pacific took its first decisive step.
Yoo Jae-won’s capacity for swift action was legendary, and Carmack was every bit his equal. After spending the entire morning immersed in discussion, they ate lunch and immediately shifted into high gear. They had no choice. The Xbox 2 launch could not slip past next Thanksgiving at the latest, leaving them roughly one year. Producing an AAA title in twelve months was madness, yet two hundred million dollars made that madness possible.
In the mid-21st century Yoo Jae-won had come from, people used to say that if something looked impossible, you should first ask whether the problem was simply a lack of money. With enough funds, most obstacles could be bulldozed. The Pacific was no exception.
Better still, countless third-party studios were already licensed for the ID Tech Engine. Treating them as an extended outsourcing network would buy precious time. An all-hands meeting was called at ID Software, the project was briefed, and the studio switched to total war footing. Only ten percent of the development staff would remain on ID Tech Engine maintenance; everyone else was reassigned to The Pacific.
Gamers with sharp instincts immediately sensed the seismic shift. A mere change in personnel allocation told them a titanic project had begun. While most players were lost in Legend League or the first World of Warcraft expansion, The Burning Crusade, hardcore FPS fans had no greater studio than ID Software. Many swelled with anticipation at the sight of a company that had been quiet for years suddenly moving with such purpose.
The developers felt the same electric excitement. Not a single one failed to thrill at the prospect of a new project—especially a launch title for Xbox 2. Curiously, a large portion of the current staff were participating in actual game development for the first time. ID Software had grown far beyond its 1990s scale, hiring new talent every year. Yet because the studio had focused on refining the ID Tech Engine rather than shipping new games in recent years, few of the recent hires had ever touched a live title.
Creating a masterpiece on such a brutal timeline would be grueling, but the developers’ joy stemmed precisely from that long drought.
Unfortunately, Yoo Jae-won could not join them immediately. There was nothing for him to do yet, and a mountain of prerequisite tasks demanded his attention. He promised to return once a playable alpha build existed, then flew back to San Francisco.
Upon arrival, he did the one thing that mattered most: he reconvened the TF team that had designed the original Xbox. ID Technology engineers formed project-specific teams and returned to their regular posts once the work concluded. The entire purpose of organizing ID Group had been to give systematic form to Yoo Jae-won’s impulsive initiatives. Thus, when he summoned the Xbox design team once again, nearly every member answered the call.
Not quite one hundred percent. A few had resigned, others were on extended leave. One unexpected statistic within ID Group was the unusually high attrition rate among developers in their third and fourth years. First- and second-year turnover was lower than industry average, but years three and four saw more departures than at peer IT firms. The reason was brutally simple: the work was simply too intense.
Executives who first reviewed the data often protested that eight-hour days and five-day weeks created an environment superior to any Korean conglomerate and comparable to Nordic standards. They missed the distinction between hours and intensity. Maintaining peak performance inside the legendary Alpha Team for eight straight hours, day after day, without ever dropping tension, eventually broke people. Burnout claimed many after three or four years of unrelenting pressure.
Fortunately, general administrative and production staff enjoyed far lower attrition, so overall average tenure still looked respectable. In the case of the Xbox TF team, roughly eighty percent of the original members still answered the summons four years later. Sixteen people in total gathered inside a small conference room at ID Technology headquarters. Yoo Jae-won stood before them and officially launched the Xbox 2 project.
“This time, let’s target the upper eight-hundred-dollar range.”
Price would be the foundation on which everything else rested.
“You’re not seriously thinking of launching at $299 again, are you?”
The former leader of the original Xbox TF team went white. The first Xbox had carried a manufacturing cost in the upper six hundreds yet sold for half that—$299. Each unit lost roughly three hundred dollars. Although software sales were supposed to recoup the deficit, the attach rate had been a dismal 4.8 games per console. The plan had failed.
Now the target was the upper eight hundreds. Selling at $299 would mean a five-hundred-dollar loss per unit.
“This time we’ll raise the retail price in line with the increased cost,” Yoo Jae-won said calmly. “I’m thinking $499.”
The team leader exhaled in relief. A three-hundred-dollar loss per console was still painful, but infinitely better than bleeding endlessly. Besides, while setting specifications for the IDDC 2003 reveal, he had already suspected this would not be an ordinary machine. Building a PC to Yoo Jae-won’s claimed performance targets would easily surpass $1,200.
A six-core CPU did not yet exist in the market. Intel and AMD were preparing eight-core models for next year, but even ID Group had not received samples. The same applied to GPUs. Cards capable of true full-HD performance were limited to flagship models costing five or six hundred dollars each.
Interestingly, ID Electronics exerted considerable influence on these price curves. NVIDIA had commissioned big-chip production and ATI had ordered mainstream small chips from them. ID Electronics had manufactured both faithfully. As a result, the phrase “the game runs on NVIDIA” became common while ATI dominated the mid-to-low-end market. Even on identical process nodes, ID Electronics’ chips delivered superior performance. NVIDIA led at the absolute high end; ATI took the larger, more profitable volume segment.
The problem was that full-HD support required those expensive big chips. The team leader could not imagine how Yoo Jae-won intended to solve the unit-cost equation.
Regardless, Yoo Jae-won continued without pause.
“Backward compatibility is, of course, mandatory.”
Though the original Xbox had enjoyed a short lifespan, it had produced several masterpieces. Halo and GTA III remained potent weapons in the Xbox arsenal. The joy of true classics survived even dated graphics. They were the kind of games you could pull out years later and still enjoy.
“That shouldn’t be difficult,” the team leader said, forehead smoothing for the first time.
PCs had always run legacy software regardless of generation; the architecture guaranteed it. The Xbox had inherited that philosophy, so backward compatibility required little extra thought. The CPU would remain x86, and the GPU already used the Glide library.
Yoo Jae-won’s directives kept coming. With every sentence, the blueprint for Xbox 2 grew clearer and more ambitious.
“But are we really sticking with DVD for the media drive?” one team member asked cautiously when the discussion reached storage.
He endured a sharp glance from the team leader but held his ground.
“You believe DVD is insufficient?” Yoo Jae-won asked.
“Yes, Chairman. Sony has been aggressively promoting its next-generation optical disc, Blu-ray. Same physical size as DVD, yet it stores anywhere from twenty-five to fifty gigabytes. DVD tops out at 4.2.”
Yoo Jae-won nodded. The observation was entirely reasonable. Next-generation consoles would naturally upgrade their optical drives, and Sony was championing Blu-ray. In his previous timeline, Microsoft had chosen HD-DVD. Both technologies used blue lasers to increase density, yet Blu-ray had won decisively and dominated the market well into the 2020s.
Logically, Blu-ray was the correct choice. Yet Yoo Jae-won refused to follow Microsoft’s past mistake. Sony held the largest stake in the Blu-ray consortium. Choosing it now, while engaged in fierce multi-front competition with Sony, would amount to handing them victory.
Therefore his primary selection remained DVD. Of course it could not satisfy the storage demands of a next-generation machine. He had already prepared the logical alternative: digital download.
“Digital download? You mean Steam, sir? Steam has supported Xbox 1 for quite some time now.”
Digital distribution was no longer revolutionary. Steam had been operating for years. Moreover, it had never overtaken physical sales. On the original Xbox, Steam accounted for less than thirty percent of game revenue. To the team, opposing Blu-ray with Steam seemed like an overreach.