Pacific Drive is an entry on the Nebula Awards Suggested Reading List for 2025. With nominations now open, we'd like to highlight the achievements in storytelling in our game about witnessing the human cost of mankind's mistakes in a weird, decrepit station wagon.Pacific Drive breaks ground with its uniquely Americana take on the exclusion zone subgenre. By centering the human aftermath of displaced communities, working class powerlessness in the face of government control, and the lived experiences of queer relationships and minority identities in the 1950's, Pacific Drive achieves an examination of the human cost of the choices made by the individual and by a nation's controlling bodies. With over 100,000 words delivered across a voiced story told by characters speaking through a car radio, a standalone investigative journalism "podcast" series collected in-game, and collectible written entries, Pacific Drive's story is rich, original, and emotional in beautifully unexpected ways. Plenty more on this below!Thank you for your time in considering Pacific Drive on the Nebula Award ballot. SFWA members can request a copy of the game, as well as access a recorded version of the game's story in the links.

WHAT IS PACIFIC DRIVE?

Pacific Drive is a video game (PS5, PC) where it’s you and your wood-paneled station wagon against a Pacific Northwest reimagined as an anomaly-filled exclusion zone. Called "Stephen King's X-Files in a Station Wagon" by AutoEvolution, Pacific Drive sold 600,000 units in its first five months, reaching Steam’s Top 10 Best Selling Games during its release, and was named Top Gear’s game of the month in May 2024. The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) Game Awards longlisted it for Best Narrative and New Intellectual Property, and The Game Awards nominated it for Best Debut Indie Game.

What’s THE STORY?

Your scenic drive is suddenly interrupted when you find yourself trapped inside the long-abandoned Olympic Exclusion Zone. Helping you find a way out is Oppy, an embittered scientist whose utopian invention was both America’s greatest hope and the cause of the Olympic Peninsula’s destruction. As you travel deeper into the heart of the Zone, you uncover long-buried secrets about government experimentation, its human cost, and why that station wagon you’re driving may not be all that it seems.Urban legends meet supernatural encounters in this tale about loneliness, regret, and the legacy of what we leave behind.

THE MAKING OF PACIFIC DRIVE

Pacific Drive breaks ground with its uniquely classic Americana take on the exclusion zone subgenre, featuring a cast of fully-realized characters with minority identities to complement the game’s unusual premise. As the player navigates the surreal Olympic Exclusion Zone with only a station wagon as shelter, the game's themes centering obsession and isolation mirror the player's inevitable fixation on remodeling their car. At the story's heart is a dissection of the legacy of what we leave behind, the human costs of living with public and private failure, and the price of pursuing science and technology at all costs.The game’s mix of exploration and survival required unconventional narrative structures to match its original format. To achieve this, Pacific Drive layers its narrative to tell its story from a 360-degree perspective that spans time and place. To cement the player's dependence on their car, the characters speak only through the car's radio, delivering essential motivation to progress while also reflecting on their place in causing the physical and psychological scars of the world around them. The game pioneers storytelling in games with its inclusion of a fully-realized, 10-episode investigative journalism "podcast" that players collect, playing with perspective by telling the Zone's story from the outside looking in, demonstrating how truth can be muddied when curious neighbors are instructed to ignore their eyes and ears. Collected like puzzle pieces, a wealth of written entries and ambient radio transmissions fill in the world's complex alternate history, centering human encounters with the unexplainable, rather than delivering precise definitions or instructions.By centering the human aftermath of displaced communities, working class powerlessness in the face of government control, and the lived experiences of queer relationships and minority identities in the 1950's, Pacific Drive achieves an examination of the human cost of the choices made by the individual and by a nation's controlling bodies.Pacific Drive excels beyond what is typically expected of a genre narrative, offering drama, comedy, mystery and even heartbreak, giving players an experience that remains long after they have completed the game. The game has been called "Stephen King's X-Files in a Station Wagon" by AutoEvolution, and the writing has garnered praise as "funny and compelling" by GamesRadar, "exquisite" by ScreenRant, and "heartful" by DreadCentral. It has been longlisted by The British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA) Game Awards for Best Narrative and New Intellectual Property.

STORY TEAM

Karrie Shirou Shao
Lead Narrative Designer & Lead WriterKarrie wrote Pacific Drive’s main story and the entirety of its voiced dialogue. She also designed the game’s missions and narrative delivery methods, implemented the narrative in Unreal Engine 4, and cast and directed voiceover recording.Karrie previously wrote on League of Legends (the most played PC game of all time) and Per Aspera (2020 DICE Nominee for Strategy/Simulation Game of the Year). She is a BAFTA Breakthrough 2024 talent.

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Paul Dean
WriterPaul contributed a wealth of writing, lore, and worldbuilding to Pacific Drive. He wrote a majority of the written text in the game, including item descriptions, logbook entries, F.A.X. machine entries and menu text.Paul was a co-founder, writer, and presenter for Shut Up & Sit Down, one of board gaming’s most prominent websites and shows. He’s also designed several tabletop RPGs, written for Vice, Eurogamer, Rock Paper Shotgun, and the Guardian, and has been featured on BBC and CBC radio.