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Carmack takes aim at "snooty" indies

Condemns Call of Duty bashing.

id Software co-founder John Carmack has attacked "snooty" independent developers who criticise FPS developers for being too conservative.

Speaking in an interview with IndustryGamers, Carmack argued that a developer's job is to make games that people love and are willing to open their wallets for, not games that push boundaries.

"I'm actually happy Rage is a little bit different in terms of feeling and tone. It's not just, 'Here's your squad mates'," he explained before saying his piece.

"But that's still a proven formula that people like, and it's a mistake to [discount that]. As long as people are buying it, it means they're enjoying it. If they buy the next Call of Duty, it's because they loved the last one and they want more of it.

"So I am pretty down on people who take the sort of creative auteurs' perspective," he continued. "It's like 'Oh, we"re not being creative.' But we're creating value for people - that's our job!

"It's not to do something that nobody's ever seen before. It's to do something that people love so much they're willing to give us money for.

"So I do get pretty down on people that - you see some of the indie developers that really take a snooty attitude about this. It's almost as if it's popular, it's not good. And that's just not true."

Rage, id's latest effort and its first new IP since Quake launched in 1996, is due out on PC, PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in October.