JohnCarmack
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id Software and Fountainhead create id Mobile
It was announced today that id, the company that invented the graphics-card pushing first-person shooter genre, has made the leap onto smaller screens with a new division simply called id Mobile, created in conjunction with Fountainhead Entertainment. The studio will be focused on games for cell phones, DS and PSP, with a few titles (like a mobile Wolfenstein) already in the works.id and Fountainhead have been headed this way for a while, after Doom RPG and the Orcs and Elves games. As you've probably seen, most mobile games are pretty awful (something even id's John Carmack admitted to in this interview about the new division), but if anyone can turn that around, we have faith that Carmack's the guy. (Especially since the rocket thing didn't pan out.)
Carmack's lunar lander blows up (we feel guilty)
We know we can't blame ourselves. We won't lie: it hurt when id Software's John Carmack seemingly left the gaming scene to dabble in rocket science. Sure, there was DOOM RPG and Orcs & Elves, but we knew all along he was capable of so much more. Then along comes Carmack's QuakeCon '07 keynote and in it, news of Rage (their first id Tech 5-engine game), Quake Zero, Quake Arena for XBLA, another Wolfenstein game, and the id catalog hopping onto Steam. Yeah, that's a lot to heap onto anyone's plate ... especially an amatuer rocket scientist's Cape Canaveral collector's edition plate. Carmack's Armadillo Aerospace made an attempt on Sunday to cash in on this year's X Prize Cup by having their Lunar Lander hop from launch and landing pads, simulating a real lunar landing. Unfortunately, even after two successful runs, the craft's engine exploded shortly after ignition on what would be their final attempt. Carmack said, simply, "Today is officially a bad day when it comes to our vehicle." True enough, John. We just hope you didn't feel too distracted by all the wonderful treats brewing at your other job as a game designer 'cause then, we'd feel really guilty. [Via Eurogamer]
John Carmack doesn't believe in PPUs? Fine, then PPUs don't believe in John Carmack
We wouldn't go so as far to say that developers in the dedicated PPU world are "firing back" over John Carmack's statement last week that he is "not a believer in dedicated PPUs," but we would at least say that they're offering alternative opinions. In a recent Bit-tech article, Ageia's Dan Forster tackles concerns over the need for PPUs, and (in)directly addresses Carmack's statement that "multiple CPU cores will be much more useful in general," by suggesting that no matter how many cores are involved, there are timing issues between them when being distributed to separate tasks. Forster claims "At the moment, there's not a single game that supports multi-threading even at a basic level..." Leaving some of us to wonder just what Carmack is on about -- but do you really want to question the man who created Doom? Didn't think so.
John Carmack doesn't believe in dedicated PPUs
John Carmack has always been vocally opposed to the concept of dedicated Physics processors for gaming PCs, but his latest statement on the topic really hammers the nail in. Talking to Boot Daily on the topic of Intel's QX6850 CPU, Carmack states that future multiple core CPUs will be able to take the strain of physics processing. Carmack does have a fair degree of interest in this area, with Ageia's PhysX card being supported on the Unreal Engine 3 platform, which happens to be developed by iD software's rival, Epic Games. If there's one thing we can be sure to garner out of this statement, it's that iD software's new gaming platform iD Tech 5 won't be one that favors dedicated physics processors.[Via Digg]
John Carmack continues to eyeball the DS, considers Quake-style game
After some waffling and then an announcement (as well as a recent re-announcement) of the mobile game Orcs & Elves headed DS-ward, programmer and co-founder of id Software John Carmack is toying with yet another idea for the handheld: a Quake Arena-style game. Carmack offered the system some backhanded compliments while discussing his work on Orcs & Elves, saying that he loved working on the system, but that he noticed a few of what he termed "rookie mistakes." We can only guess that he is talking about issues that came up with the newer features of the DS, because we're pretty sure that Nintendo knows a thing or two about handhelds by now. However, Carmack must have enjoyed himself, because now he's toying with this new idea of a Quake game on the dual screens, so we'll keep an eye out and see what develops.
John Carmack id tech 5 demo from WWDC
Here's the demo of id tech 5, id Software's new graphical engine, running on a Mac at the WWDC keynote. It looks very nice (it should, at 20gb of textures), and Carmack says the engine will allow programmers to come in and get the game right first, and then let their artists loose on it. Levels can be designed before anything else, and then artists can come and design the landscape and the colors around that.I'm not sure how well that works, but we'll see soon: Carmack also says he'll have this showing on both consoles and desktops (Mac and PC) at E3, as well as "another Mac related announcement" that he can't quite bring himself to tell us about at this point. Considering all of id's games are already available on OS X (released by Aspyr, who have to be shaking in their boots after all the announcements this week), we have no idea at all what that might be.
John Carmack of id Software unveils new ultra high detail game engine
Yesterday, during the keynote address at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference, John Carmack revealed some footage of a new game engine. The video above is the best quality you're going to get for a little while. At least until id release some footage themselves. Despite this, however, it still looks stunning.Dubbed "id Tech 5," the new engine promises to almost completely remove any limitations on texture size, allowing "for the unique customization of the entire game world at the pixel level." Examples include changing material colours on the fly and etching fine detail, such as initials, into existing geometry. As the video says, the footage above uses over 20 gigabytes of texture files. Presumably, with their developments into new compression methods, we'll be seeing all this fit onto a 9 gigabyte DVD. It'll have to if they plan on releasing games that run on this engine onto the PC and Xbox 360. Games on the PS3, on the other hand, will be able to take advantage of the 50 gigabytes of storage on Blu-Ray discs, allowing for lower compression and, we assume, faster loading as a result.This is all just speculation for now, however. Other than the above video and the blurb that has been posted on the id Software official website, there's no specific information. We'll have to wait until E3 for that.[Via CVG and Engadget]
Carmack blasts Vista gaming initiative
id Software's John Carmack isn't ready for his studio to make the jump to Windows Vista. "Nothing is going to help a new game by going to a new operating system. There were some clear wins going from Windows 95 to Windows XP for games, but there really aren't any for Vista," Carmack recently told Game Informer during a lengthy interview, which also featured id colleague Todd Hollenshead.While Carmack remains keen on Xbox 360, he thinks the Vista initiative is bogus, accusing Microsoft of using the new OS's "artificial" tie with DirectX 10 to lure consumers (and developers). "They're really grasping at straws for reasons to upgrade the operating system. I suspect I could run XP for a great many more years without having a problem with it," concluded Carmack. Good news for those content with XP.[Via GamesIndustry.biz]See also: Games for Windows Vista: how the new brand & OS will change PC gaming
John Carmack taps DS for latest game
In a brief interview with Game|Life's Chris Kohler, the lead ego at id Software (psychology joke!) expresses interest in porting one of his recent cellphone titles to Nintendo's touchy-feely portable. John Carmack explains that the potential port of Orcs and Elves (not to be confused with long-rumored comedy adventure, Orko and ALF) would be enhanced and would represent his first step back into the historically colorful lands of Nintendo. Carmack recalls that "we were always just kind of peeved at the whole Nickelodeon censor arrangement with Nintendo. So we've kept them at arm's length for many console generations now." Thankfully, Nintendo has long since embraced limb-severing violence and is unlikely to inject bizarre green blood into Carmack's tale of swords, sorcery and ... is that Smaug?
Id says 360 is a gem to develop on
In an interview with CVG, Id developer John Carmack talks about how easy it is to develop on the 360 for the upcoming Nazi killing shooter Castle Wolfenstein and said that "the Xbox 360 is the first console that I've ever worked with that actually has development tools that are better for games than what we've got for the PC." Whoa, those are bold claims Mr. Carmack ... bold claims indeed. Both Id and Raven are teaming up to create this next-gen shooter and both are working hard to squeeze as much power out of the 360 as possible. A true Xbox 360 fanboy has to be excited about this game, but be sure to keep your guard up, because we all know of a certain game developed by team Id/Raven that didn't live up to its potential (crappy multiplayer just angers me).
Carmack returns to cell games with Orcs & Elves
MTV News has a story on Doom co-creator, and gaming guru, John Carmack's latest FPS megahit Orcs & Elves; only thing is, it's not based on some new super-engine that he hand-coded -- using only one hand, mind you -- while building rocketships with the other. Nope, it's a cell phone game. And it's not even an FPS really, it's "an interpolated first-person action-adventure sort of RPG." Err, right.So why return to cell phone gaming so soon after the unlikely hit of last year's Doom RPG? Sure, Fountainhead, the game design company working on Orcs & Elves for EA (who bought Doom RPG's publisher Jamdat last year) is run by Carmack's Mrs., but there has to be more to get one of PC gaming's biggest power-developers trading in his Ferrari for a Yugo. His vision: "'I do sort of have this grand scheme of, we do Orcs & Elves and we do a sequel and we go into this massively multiplayer Orcs & Elves world.' He sees people connecting across their cell phones, using the phone's built-in speaker and earpiece to communicate through the fantasy world."Some Verizon customers can get the game this Sunday, with additional cell phone platforms available in July.
