Despite a franchise title and premise that suggest upcoming video game “Homefront: The Revolution” (out May 17) is a sequel to 2011’s “Homefront,” it actually isn’t. Sure, it’s still about a guerrilla war fought on U.S. soil against occupying forces from North Korea, but it’s a completely different timeline.
Whereas the first game took place in a theoretical future, “Homefront: The Revolution” follows an alternate history that branches off during the Korean War. The major figure in this divergent timeline is Joe Tae-se, the son of a North Korean woman and an American GI who was born in North Korea during the war. Since his mother only knew the father’s first name, she used it for her son’s surname.
For the next two decades, events unfold largely as they did in our timeline, with the Vietnam War and assassination of President Kennedy in 1963, but with one key difference for the balance of power between East and West: the Apollo 10 astronauts are killed when their reentry pod’s parachute fails to deploy. NASA cancels the remaining missions, and the Soviet Union is first to put a man on the Moon, in 1971.
After massive, devastating flooding in 1977, North Korean leader Kim Il-sung resigns and is succeeded by a more expansionist regime. In our timeline, Kim Il-sung ruled until his death in 1994, and was successeded by his son, Kim Jong-il.
In 1972 Joe drops out of college and teams up with nerd pal Lee Jae-sung to found APeX Computers in their garage. Over the years, APeX basically becomes this timeline’s version of Apple, dominating the home computer market with the APeX I in 1975 and the APeX II in 1982, after which they hire top American talent like Steve Wozniak and Bill Gates.
Joe Tae-se’s son is born in 1982, and due to his fondness for the U.S. he passes along his own unusual naming convention, calling him John Tae-se.
The success of APeX Computers sparks the formation of the “Silicon River” community along North Korea’s Ryesong River. Obviously, this is analogous to California’s Silicon Valley in our world.
With the U.S. out of the space race, the Mir space station is launched by the Soviet Union, North Korea and China in 1986, with a big investment from APeX.
With pretty much all major computing advances taking place in North Korea, the Internet is developed there throughout the ’80s, with APeX launching the first web browser, Horizon, in 1989.
In 1997, North and South Korea reach a peace agreement and open their borders to each other.
After 9/11, which takes place as we know it, the U.S. goes to war in the Middle East. The Soviet Union, which never collapsed, surreptitiously supports the Iraqi military.
In 2004, a year after Joe Tae-se’s death, APeX launches a weapons division, headed by Joe’s son John. The U.S. buys weapons from the company to support the never-ending, ever-escalating war, racking up trillions in debt over the next few years. The war continues into the next decade and expands to Egypt, Syria and Iran.
APeX invents smartphones and tablets during the ’00s. Everyone buys them.
John McCain becomes U.S. president in 2008 and bails out the banks during the subprime mortgage crisis. He’s reelected in 2012.
In 2016, Iran sets off a nuke in the Saudi Arabian capital of Riyadh, killing hundreds of thousands of American soldiers. President McCain suspends that year’s presidential election, and is ousted in 2018, replaced by an unelected senator.
John Tae-se becomes premier of North Korea, and prevails upon the U.S. to repay its debts to his country for all those APeX weapons purchases. The U.S. can’t pay, however, raising tensions.
With the American market experiencing near-total collapse, John offers the aid of the North Korean military to help restore order. President O’Reilly doesn’t like that at all, but the people want help.
North Korea and the U.S. fail to reach agreement over aid and debt repayment, so APeX resorts to drastic measures in 2025: remotely shutting down all APeX tech in use in the U.S. — from phones to military equipment. This is John Tae-se essentially taking the U.S. hostage until the debt is repaid.
And so the North Korean military marches onto U.S. soil, control of the country handed over to them by the government. The only resistance to the occupation is local militias, some of which apparently have old tanks. But North Korean tech is more advanced, so the resistance employs more guerrilla tactics. Philly turns into a war zone, and North Korean soldiers clamp down.
And that’s where the game begins, in 2029, with you fighting alongside militia resistance in Philadelphia.
