An approach I'd like to see

[Nii Jima]

Instead of doing another "dry" treatment, why don't you guys try to humanize the Pacific War a bit? Only the Civil War, in my opinion, can even compete with the drama of war in this theater, yet up 'til now no one that I know of has tried to communicate that in a game.

The PTO exhibited the bloodiest, fiercest fighting certainly in modern history, and perhaps in all of history. Why not communicate what that was like to the guys who did the actual fighting and dying by including appropriate quotes and whatnot throughout the game? But, instead of throwing them in as an afterthought, like some have done in other games, actually put some thought and care into it. Make the player actually *feel* something of what it was like to command and/or fight in that war; for instance, knowing precisely the kind of hell he's about to send thousands of young kids just like his own into to die. Numbers simply can't convey that sort of thing, no matter how large they may be (after all, "one man's death is a tragedy; a million is a statistic").

It's just a thought, and maybe undoable, especially for anyone not disposed to such an intimate view of the war. But it is what has always attracted me to the PTO in the first place, so I'd like to see it included along with the "bare facts." I just can't see how anyone can begin to grasp the full significance of that war without it.