Id Software creating new game

By Robert Purchese Published 31 May, 2007

Carmack building fancy engine.

Id Software's Todd Hollenshead has revealed that the Quake and Doom creator is working on a new gaming franchise, powered by a brand new engine from developer John Carmack, GamesIndustry.biz is reporting.

With the finishing touches being applied to Enemy Territory: Quake Wars, the US firm's collaborative project with UK studio Splash Damage, Hollenshead insists that internal projects are still id's top priority.

Speaking exclusively to GamesIndustry.biz at a London event earlier this week, the id CEO said: "We are working on an all-new franchise: it's not Doom, it's not Quake, it's not Wolfenstein, it's not Enemy Territory, it's not even Commander Keen!

"It is a new id brand with an all-new John Carmack engine and I think that when we show it to people, once again they'll see, just like they saw when we first showed Doom 3, that John Carmack still has a lot of magic left."

Id's last major internally developed title was 2004's Doom 3, which utilised new technology created by Carmack. In the interim, id's technical director has been heavily involved in bringing games onto mobile, including Doom RPG and Orcs & Elves.

"Our first task at id is as a single studio developer," Hollenshead continued. "That's really where everything spawns from. Because John Carmack is a programming genius, who in my opinion is unequalled in video games today, he makes a great technology that we can use across a wide range of applications and different games within our suite of franchises.

"The new stuff that we're working on does have a brand new engine that John has been working on, actually is still working on today. We can’t really talk any details about it; we'll see about when the timing is right for an announcement. We like to be able to talk about stuff that we can show at the same time and it's not really ready to show yet."

Enemy Territory: Quake Wars is due for release on PC later this year, with PS3 and 360 versions to follow.

Head over to GamesIndustry.biz for more industry news.

Picture of Robert.

About Robert Purchese

Bertie is Eurogamer's Senior Staff Writer. When he's not hunting down news stories he's often found playing with his kids or gabbling about fantasy games and strange online worlds.

Read more articles from Robert by visiting the Robert Purchese archive page.

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Comments (43) Latest comment 5 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Gurgeh #1 5 years ago

    News? Old old news more like

    "GI: After Enemy Territories: Quake Wars ships with the highly modified Doom 3 engine and the MegaTexture support, is it time for you guys to move on from that engine?

    Carmack: Yes, the in-house development project that we’ve been working on is all new technology. It still has some roots in the Doom 3 technology, but almost everything is new in there. We’re still not talking about exactly what the project is, but it’s a new IP, it’s diverting a little bit from the standard id formula and it’s not just a first-person shooter. Technically, it’s build around an advancement over the MegaTexture technology from Quake Wars. Where that was applied just to the terrain, the version of the new technology applies it into everything, so we can have that level of rich detail on all the surfaces on the entire world. That’s the push that we’re making with graphics technology. The gameplay is somewhat different from anything that we’ve of done before. The company is pursuing Wolfenstein, Doom and Quake franchises with other partner developers and all, but we’re trying to develop a brand-new franchise with this new one. Hopefully, we’ll be talking about that sometime this year, and we’ll be able to go ahead and come out of our own little cone of silence about it."

    ** January 9th, 2007 ***

    [link url=http://www.gameinformer.com/News/Story/2007 01/N07.0109.1737.15034.htm
    ]http://ww w.gameinformer.com/News/Story/2...[/link]

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #2 5 years ago

    Lets hope this new engine is better than their last one.

    The Doom 3 engine was shit. Cryengine, Gamebryo, Source, Starbreeze's engine, not to mention Unreal have been making its slimy, over-dark corridors look rubbish for years now.

    Out of Doom 3, Quake 4 and Prey you'd be hard-pressed to tell them apart from screenshots. Carmack is a dinosaur, and if they're not careful, iD are going to end up hit by a proverbial comet.

  • krudster #3 5 years ago

    To be fair, it's an update. ID working on a new engine isn't news, and neither is the new IP thing (I reported that from GDC *2004*).

    [link url=http://www.eurogamer.net/article.php?article_id=55040 ]http://ww w.eurogamer.net/article.php?art...[/link]
    "It's going to be some near-future [game]. A present day or near-future thing where we can reuse the fire extinguishers, the waste baskets and some of those things like that [from Doom III] in the game." Frustratingly he gave nothing more away on the game, but it would appear that the game will be an all-new franchise and a marked departure from the hellish worlds of Quake and Doom, and possibly the closest thing the enigmatic company has come up with to real life since it burst onto the scene back in the early '90s."
    Edited by 2 at 31/05/07 @ 15:37

  • space_ace #4 5 years ago

    d3 engine was class! hey

  • spongebob #5 5 years ago

    Can't wait to see what Carmack can conjure up next. He is truly one of the few that can drop jaws. Too bad we didn't get any dates when to expect pictures or something. E3 this year? Doubt it.

  • PearOfAnguish #6 5 years ago

    No Commander Keen? I was hoping for a Dopefish game.

  • jellyhead #7 5 years ago

    I just hope they put a game into it.
    Room, shoot, key, corridor, shoot, key, room, shoot, corridor, key, shoot, room.
    Is not a game anymore.

  • nickthegun #8 5 years ago

    You forgot to put "Check PDA" in there, 5000 times.

  • Kiigan #9 5 years ago

    "Because John Carmack is a programming genius, who in my opinion is unequalled in video games today, he makes a great technology that we can use across a wide range of applications and different games within our suite of franchises."

    I think that qualifies for a Private Eye "O.B.N." (Order of the Brown Nose).

  • jellyhead #10 5 years ago

    awww, at least the PDA had some nice easter eggs and details in it. They put more thought into some of those messages than they did into the whole gameplay & level design aspect of the engine.

  • SBfistfun #11 5 years ago

    "just like they saw when we first showed Doom 3, that John Carmack still has a lot of magic left."

    Unless you want an interesting game?

  • chiz #12 5 years ago

    Shame it's not Quake5. Raven kinda killed Quake off with the terrible Quake 4 :(

  • bivith #13 5 years ago

    There are very few other engines that do dynamic lighting throughout the game as well as the Doom 3 engine. A lot was made of the Unreal 3 engine, but when Gears of War came out it looked nice enough in the cut scenes, but as soon as the Gameplay started, it reverted back to template shadows. The start of Act 3 showed it best, with a cut scene under a spotlight, with nice dynamic shadows. As soon as the gameplay started, the shadows went to non-dynamic and weren't even pointing in the same direction. There hasn't been many scenes more atmospheric than the part in Doom 3, were you are following the sentry bot with it's torch shining in the dark, red alert lights spinning, and demon fireballls, all combining to produce the best looking dynamic shadows, and this was on the Xbox 1! The only engines that have come close are the F.E.A.R engine and the Riddick engine.
    Edited by 1 at 31/05/07 @ 17:06

  • askew #14 5 years ago

    Quoom? Say it be true!

  • Tomo #15 5 years ago

    The Doom 3 engine rocks and so did the game itself. Some of you lot have no taste.

  • PearOfAnguish #16 5 years ago

    No, Doom 3 is a dull and unimaginative corridor shooter that would barely have passed muster 10 years ago, and the engine is a shiny bump-mapped mess.

  • Waldo #17 5 years ago

    Doom 3 was a solid game: great atmosphere, excellent sound design, and one of the most intricately-detailed environments ever seen in an action game. The basic gameplay was flawed, but the game was so immersive you wanted to keep pushing on just to see the next new area.

    I guess it's "cool" to hate on it, though.

    Quake 4 was good too, at least in single-player. Not great, but good.

  • SeesThroughAll #18 5 years ago

    "long goodbye"?

    ROFL

    It's amazing how something so simple got past quality control.

  • Turambar #19 5 years ago

    "Microsoft better hurry up fixing Vista though, (the "long goodbye" bug is still not addressed) or theres going to be nobody around to actually look at all the upcoming DX10 stuff shiny goodness."

    Since Id engines use OpenGL i'm guessing they don't give a shit about Vista. You can expect dx10 level graphical goodness on XP from this new engine.

    Also when Doom 3 was released the engine was the most technically impressive graphics engine on the market. Opinions on the games created with the Doom 3 engine wont change this.

  • WrongShui #20 5 years ago

    Quake Wars looks fantastic, which part of it looks dull and just like Doom/Quake/Prey?

  • BillGaitas #21 5 years ago


    Doom 3 is an action packed game passed on a claustrophobic extraterrestrial highly detailed environment, and its awesome. Loved it from the beginning to the end.

    Id still got it

  • Freek #22 5 years ago

    The magic kinda wore off when the future became open enviroments and less predictable then Doom 3.
    But when the competition is strong you often get better games as devs start to realize that getting peoples money is less certain and they have to actually do something really good.
    So here's hoping Id is up to the task.

  • Crea #23 5 years ago

    Not sure, but I was under the impression that id had really lost ground to Epic et al in the engine licensing market in recent years - apart from a few titles I can't think of anything that used Doom 3, although I'm sure some helpful poster will correct me. I wonder how much this is driving their recent decision making.

    I loved Doom 3...for about 1 hour. When the enforced torch/weapon switching and monster cupboards started arriving, however, I checked out. Carmack is a genius, but they really need to up the ante on their next title as far as I'm concerned, if the game is to be considered anything other than a lengthy tech demo.

  • Khab #24 5 years ago

    I really couldn't get into Doom3 as a game, but there's no denying what he did with shadows in it, still unequalled today, as has been said. Go ahead, boot it up and go into the corner-room with the spinning thingy on the first level. Eat your heart out Gears of War... (which I've completed twice and loved, thankyou.)

  • ChromeMud #25 5 years ago

    So many kids spitting their dummies out 'round here!
    John Carmack kicked ass at the dawn of 3D shooters and
    still kicks a lot of ass now.REEESPECT!!!

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #26 5 years ago

    The shadows stuff is 'unequalled' and 'unique' because it doesn't add enough to gameplay to be worth the heavy processing cost. If iD makes another one-trick pony engine (and one which can't run well on the current gen of games consoles) then they're going to suffer middling reviews and poor engine license uptake much like they have in recent years.

    Besides, remeber that the 'Carmack' shadowing technique that was the 'genius' of the Doom 3 engine was already patented by someone else when the game came out. After their recent run of mediocrity, I seriously doubt that John Carmack has the clout with graphics card manufacturers that he had at the time when all the games were using Quake 3's engine.

  • rogermellie #27 5 years ago

    As brilliant as their engines always are, people never mention just how good the art design has been all in their games.

  • Doogle #28 5 years ago

    "Quoom? Say it be true!"

    Hehe

  • andromeda #29 5 years ago

    @ziphos

    i'm not normally judgemental but you're a cretin.
    John Carmack has given us great things over the years, and has normally led the field in what he does. Singlehandedly too. Shame his engines are wrapped up in halfbaked games. But he's a coder, not a level designer. I'd love to see him work with warren spector types as opposed to Jon Romero types but hey that's life.

    have a bit of respect at least, and remember the first time you booted up Quake.

  • bivith #30 5 years ago

    @Mentalist
    "The shadows stuff is 'unequalled' and 'unique' because it doesn't add enough to gameplay to be worth the heavy processing cost."

    That's just bullshit. It's easy to say "we don't need it" if you haven't got it/can't do it. The fact is it did add to gameplay, and as for "processing cost" they got it running on the XBox 1 FFS!

    "Besides, remeber that the 'Carmack' shadowing technique that was the 'genius' of the Doom 3 engine was already patented by someone else when the game came out"

    Again bullshit. Firstly having a patent on a technique is a million miles away from an actual feasible, efficient implimentation, and secondly Carmack independently invented the technique, i.e. he didn't use the patented method. Maybe he would have patented it, but he hates software patenting, and would never do it.
    Edited by 1 at 01/06/07 @ 10:20

  • bonker #31 5 years ago

    I'd like to go back in time and obliterate all-things-ID from ever existing so that maybe we can have games again ...

  • Shadar #32 5 years ago

    The Doom 3 engine was shit. Cryengine, Gamebryo, Source, Starbreeze's engine, not to mention Unreal have been making its slimy, over-dark corridors look rubbish for years now.

    Ahem. The Doom 3 engine still has more realistic and subtle rendering of light and shadow than the UE3 engine is capable of, and its first implementation is several years younger. The UE3 engine has more bells and whistles (because it was a twinkle in Tim Sweeney's eyes in 2004), Source has been in constant development (and who's to say the updated Doom 3 engine used in Quake Wars won't be better?) and in my opinion Crysis isn't currently existing technology because, well ... it doesn't feature in a completed, playable game yet. A lot of the proposed technology isn't even in there yet.

    John Carmack set this generation's graphical paradigm with his implementation of light and normal maps. In other words, he's still the most important programmer in the western games industry. To quote the good Tim Sweeney, when asked by Edge what else they need to complete their world domination of the middleware market: "John Carmack."

  • kangarootoo #33 5 years ago

    @Xiphos

    I get the feeling you simply didn't enjoy Doom 3. Whilst that is fine and dandy, your disdane for the game in question seems to be clouding your judgement a little. Normally you make a fair amount of sense, but what I have read thus far in this thread is just crazy ranting.

    "Quake 4 is for people who don't give a hell's testicle about what Quake 3 actually meant to online multiplayer, and just want to continue to bat away at making a winning out of it by just playing it against people who have no want to actually want to play it "

    What the hell does that even mean?!

    Whether you like the game or not, you can surely see that overall ID have contributed greatly to the games we all play. Even if all they did is push competitors to create the games you DO like playing.

    Part of IDs business is licensing their engine. Doom 3 was as much an advert for the engine as it was a game itself (Far Cry and Serious Sam are much the same). I'm not going to hate them or pretend they aren't talented just because part of their business involves (oh the horror) making money.

    Now calm down and explain exactly what it is that makes you unhappy about ID working on a new game.

    /disengages paronisation engine

  • kangarootoo #34 5 years ago

    @bonker

    "so that maybe we can have games again"

    What, like minesweeper? ;)

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #35 5 years ago

    I don't deny that Carmack has achieved great things in the past. Though much like Ken Kutaragi (kicks off diversionary flame war) he has been subject to diminishing returns of late. People are giving him all this credit these days, when he's been behind the curve in terms of what game engines need in order to make great games for quite some time.

    as for "processing cost" they got it running on the XBox 1 FFS!

    At a risible, stuttering frame rate, unlike Chronicles of Riddick. And Quake 4's performance on Xbox 360 has been widely accepted as disappointing. Enemy Territory has much to prove.

  • MENTAL1ST Verified Senior Software Engineer, Picsel UK Ltd. #36 5 years ago

    Crysis isn't currently existing technology

    I was talking about Far Cry.

  • bivith #37 5 years ago

    "At a risible, stuttering frame rate, unlike Chronicles of Riddick."

    Absolute bollocks. Doom 3 on the XBox was rock solid.

    "And Quake 4's performance on Xbox 360 has been widely accepted as disappointing."

    I can't argue with that one though.

  • kangarootoo #38 5 years ago

    "Doom 3 on the XBox was rock solid"

    I concur. Also, the co-op mode on XB D3 was loadsa fun.

  • abigsmurf #39 5 years ago

    The doom 3 engine is now pretty old yet it still has the most advanced lighting engine of any game engine. You can't deny Carmack has constantly led the field with 3D engines.

    He popularised raycasting with the wolfenstein engine. He popularised BSP based 3d engines with Quake. Quake 2 was revolutionary in the way it used 3d acceleration. Quake 3 introduced spline based curved surfaces and a revolutionary inverse square root function.

    Carmack is simply a genius when it comes to graphics engines. Here's hoping he actually manages to implement fractal based textures in a game, something that's been promised for years...

  • ph101 #40 5 years ago

    Indeed carmack clearly has some skill. Doom 3 engine seemed very decent given the timeframe - when vids were first posted of the that engine most reused to believe they were even real...

  • kangarootoo #41 5 years ago

    @Xiphos

    Well thats a bit more info. Thanks for humouring me :)

    "very isolated 3D engines which simply pick and poke at the tiny portions of the current capabilities of 'the period' gen GPU."

    If I understand that correctly I might suggest that some would thanks him for getting the best out of current tech, rather than asking everyone to buy a new PC every time he releases a game.

    "They're using John Carmack's engines to simply get a foothold. That's low."

    I'm sure sure how it is low. On the one hand customers have a choice as to what they, and on the other licensing their engine to 3rd parties is part of their business as previously mentioned, and I'm not sure having a versatile business model is particularly low (its not like they are conning coffee farmers or anything).

    Given your mention of shaders and so on, I shall go out on a cheeky limb (risking patronising you again, so apologies in advance). I'm willing to bet you have just spend a fair chunk on a super hot PC and you are a bit annoyed that ID aren't one of the companies which produce games that, in your experience, allow you to get the best out of your investment. Would seem like a fair guess?

  • Lother #42 5 years ago

    FPS games were great at first, even the pixelated monstrosities like Shadow Warrior. Then they just got prettier and prettier, but playing them gave me head aches. It really does seem like FPS games are generally targeted at gung-ho morons(I'm not saying anyone who plays them is one). And truth be told, gung ho morons usually prefer FPS and EA games EXCLUSIVELY. It's a sad state of affairs when the most mass appealing games are those that appeal to the lowest IQ. No wonder such niche games like Planescape Torment, Xenogears and Xenosaga appeal to so few.

    A shame really since I feel playing a game should be the same as watching a really good movie or reading an excellent book.
    Edited by 1 at 01/06/07 @ 14:48

  • kangarootoo #43 5 years ago

    @Lother

    I think the mass market approach you describe (a little harshly I thought) is because the market has expanded, and with those extra numbers the market overall has changed.

    There was a time where gamers were comparitively small in number, and generally the group was not as diverse as it is now (which is pretty talk for saying there were more geeks and brain boxes). Now the market has expanded a greater portion of gamers want what might be described as a quicker experience.

    Now I wouldn't say that is necessarily a bad thing, so long as everyone is catered for in the end. And I think you are being a little overcritical of the current market, when all you are really saying is that less gamers like the same stuff as you.

    I love films that make me think, but I also love crappy monster movies. And if both get made, everyone is happy.

    The sorts of games you used to play still get made, they just don't get so many headlines. I would also suggest that they get made just as frequently as they used to. It doesn't seem that way as the higher number of games released these days make them seem less frequent.

    Likewise there are still good cerebral movies and books out there, despite the fact that the majority of media attention gets put on 28 Weeks Later and Harry Potter (both of which I would still rate on their own merits).