id Software update

Kevin Cloud, co-founder of id Software and one of the artists who sacked Paul Steed on Wednesday night, has updated his .plan to explain his side of the story, pointing out that "Paul Steed is one of the most vocal and controversial people in gaming. Therefore, it is not surprising that his departure from id would also be controversial."

"Although Adrian and I alone made the decision to fire Paul, it is the general opinion among the rest of id that we made the right decision. Paul was not fired as a result of his support for DOOM. Other people at id supported DOOM in the exact same manner. For several reasons it was time for id software and Paul Steed to part company."

The good news is that "John [Carmack] and I have agreed to disagree, put our differences behind us and move on to make DOOM the best game we can make it". Aw, bless. Check Kevin's .plan for the full story.

Meanwhile Mark Dochtermann of Ritual has announced in his own .plan that Jim Dose, "chief technologist" at Ritual, has been hired by id Software to work on the new Doom game. We live in interesting times...

As we had pointed out just a few weeks ago, the recent departures of John Cash, Brian Hook and Zoid from id Software had left a big hole in their programming department, which Jim will no doubt help to fill. The Magic 8 Ball says that next on id's shopping list will no doubt be some more level designers, and maybe a dedicated audio guy, not to mention the two modellers that they have already advertised for. So get your resumes polished!