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Games Entertainment

id Software Working on New Title 157

Posted by Zonk from the magical-software dept.
id Software has announced that, powered by the 'magic' of a new Carmack-crafted engine, an entirely new franchise is on the way. GamesIndustry.biz reports that the venerable FPS development house is hard at work on a completely original game. Without ties to Doom or Quake, the company hopes to begin moving in some new and interesting directions. "Id's last major internally developed title was 2004's Doom 3, which utilized 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,' [Todd] 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.'"
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id Software Working on New Title More

id Software Working on New Title

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  • News Flash (Score:3, Informative)

    by sokoban ( 142301 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:23PM (#19342287) Homepage
    A company which has not released a product in 4 years is starting work on a new product.

    That's about all the article has to say.

    • Re:News Flash (Score:4, Insightful)

      by gstoddart ( 321705 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:30PM (#19342405) Homepage

      A company which has not released a product in 4 years is starting work on a new product.

      That's about all the article has to say.

      And, that Carmack is working on it. Which, apparently to some people, is as good as Jobs promising a new product -- pure magic. :-P

      I bet there will be audible squeals from some people over that alone! (Note: not me, I'm too old to squeal over such things. =)

      Cheers

    • Re: (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Fozzyuw ( 950608 )
      hehe, it's an MMO... come on, you know it is. An MMO FPS.

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by __aaclcg7560 ( 824291 )
      They had to wait for the hardware to catch up with what Carmack wanted to do next. I wouldn't be surprised if the minimum hardware spec is a quad-core CPU, 1GB video card, 4GB memory and a 64-bit operating system.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Runefox ( 905204 )
      Same could be said about Blizzard and StarCraft II. Their last game was WoW (2004), which was released before id's last published PC game, Quake 4 (and the same year as Doom 3, their last in-house developed game), and I don't consider an expansion pack (Burning Crusade), no matter how much content is added, to be anything remotely similar to a full game.

      However, to threaten the WoW-subscribers... To speak ill of their beloved in such a way as you have id, even so little as you actually have, to insult their
  • Where is the story here? And when is the next Duke Nukem title due?

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by CFBMoo1 ( 157453 )
      I will laugh if iD got tired of waiting for Duke Nuke'm Forever and decided to do it themselves.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by mulvane ( 692631 )
        I"m sure they would have copyright problems with that...Maybe we should be expecting Nuke Dukem Forever.
        • ..actually, trademark problems... but we know what you meant.

          • Re: (Score:1)

            by mulvane ( 692631 )
            Glad someone did.. I really should pay more attention to my work than trying to write slashdot comment with the time constraint of my boss not seeing it.
    • Wait, isn't Duke Nukem Forever developed by 3D realms?
    • Maybe id Software in fact bought that intellectual property and is set to do that one. *dun dun dun*

  • Carmack's opinion (Score:3, Interesting)

    by moderatorrater ( 1095745 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:27PM (#19342359)
    I wonder what John Carmack thinks of DirectX/OpenGL improvements that have come out since 2004. It'll be interesting to see what he can do with the new technologies.

    Also, assuming that it's an FPS, is there any new territory to cover? It seems to have pretty much just run its source and any new IP would probably just be a new flavor of aliens/demons/WW2.

    • Re:Carmack's opinion (Score:4, Funny)

      by jandrese ( 485 ) <kensama@vt.edu> on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:29PM (#19342381) Homepage Journal
      Maybe they'll blow everyone's mind and release a game that isn't a FPS.

      Nah, it'll never happen.

      • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

        by nomadic ( 141991 ) *
        Maybe they'll blow everyone's mind and release a game that isn't a FPS.

        Maybe they'll really go overboard and release a game that isn't a horror/scifi FPS seemingly based on bad 80's heavy metal album covers.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Thing 1 ( 178996 )

          Maybe they'll really go overboard and release a game that isn't a horror/scifi FPS seemingly based on bad 80's heavy metal album covers.

          Hey, two out of three ain't bad...

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Haeleth ( 414428 )

        Maybe they'll blow everyone's mind and release a game that isn't a FPS.
        Nah, it'll never happen.
        It already did happen, on many occasions, though apparently either before your time or so long ago that you've forgotten. ID were great long before Wolfenstein 3D.

        Please, God, let the new title be Commander Keen 5...

        • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

          by Haeleth ( 414428 )
          Er, I mean 7, of course. How embarrassing.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by jandrese ( 485 )
          I think everybody prefers that Commander Keen stay forgotten. ID pretty much said that themselves when they made map 32 in DooM 2.
        • Well according to this: http://www.3drealms.com/keenhistory/keenhistory2. h tml [3drealms.com]
          Keen 7-9 would be in 3d if the original creator could get the rights back to him. So, it would be a possible, if extremely long, shot.

          I must say that I would like to see ID do something other than a FPS. Perhaps I am getting old and persnickety, but the side scrollers are still quite entertaining when one does them correctly.

      • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

        by KDR_11k ( 778916 )
        Back when Doom 3 was in development Carmack was talking about how they'd make a game that's not a sequel after that. He also said it'll still be an FPS. Unless they changed plans that's what's going to happen.

        Keep in mind Quake was meant to be an RPG at first.

        • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

          by tibike77 ( 611880 )
          Stuff that hasn't been "done" to death yet:

          * First Person Clubber : a prehistoric combat game for control of a cave network

          * a game where the hero must stop the forces of Heaven from invading Earth : take that, fluffy angels !

          * we're invading an alien planet and ONOES we forgot the activation keys home, so nuking the site from orbit is not an option : slaughter all helpless life on the planet to make space for humankind

          * a reenactment of the Vietnam war : we know you hate being reminded of it, but nobody's
      • Maybe they'll blow everyone's mind and release a game that isn't a FPS.

        iD Pony Adventures.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by LBt1st ( 709520 )
      You forgot zombies ...think of the zombies.

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by mulvane ( 692631 )
      kittens!! A smart evolved bacteria that controls kittens is forcing kittens to take over the world as we know it. Its sole purpose is to eventually have a mutant controlled kitten society...The heroin of the movie must masturbate his way through the story because as you know, "masturbate and kill a kitten".

    • Re:Carmack's opinion (Score:5, Funny)

      by AdmiralWeirdbeard ( 832807 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:49PM (#19342717)
      Dude, how bout a game with Demon Aliens fighting Zombies both in space and underground, during WWII?
      How tits would that be?

    • Also, assuming that it's an FPS, is there any new territory to cover?

      Depends what you consider "new".

      There's a lot of people who seem to think that in order to be "new" or "original", a game must have entirely new and original "gameplay", and then go debate about what that would be. Most of these people wouldn't argue about a few games -- DDR and Frequency/Amplitude were very much new, both in control style and actual gameplay.

      First, new ground isn't necessary. I just got a new DDR game (having lost my o

  • Will it run on anything OTHER than Vista? Please say yes.

    • Re:So... (Score:5, Informative)

      by Mr EdgEy ( 983285 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:38PM (#19342555)
      id has had a history of releasing multi-platform, hell id is one of the only major producers i know about that actually open sources its engines after they have profited enough from them. quake3, doom3, quake4 and probably previous games all run on linux, and the client came pretty quickly after release.

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by Non-CleverNickName ( 1027234 )
      I'd definately expect so.

      id Software is still one of the few game developers that actually create games for use on multiple OSs, including Linux. None of that DirectX 10/Vista-only crap. I installed Doom 3 on my Linux installation, and surprisingly, it actually runs quicker in Linux than it does on Windows. I dual-boot with XP for gaming, so I decided to test both out, and I was able to max out all graphical settings on the Linux install with no hiccups...my Windows installation started hiccupping once I
    • I don't know of any game that runs under vista. I thought everybody was still un grading to XP. Not that Vista is an up to anything.

  • OpenGL? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by I'll Provide The War ( 1045190 )
    He has grumbled about the slow progression of this API in the past. Is now the time when he will make the jump to Direct3D?

    The Quake III engine was widely licensed for dozens of FPS titles from 1999-2005. The Doom 3 engine has been an abject failure in this regard. Epic and Valve have eaten id's lunch so to speak. Unless Carmack has made a conscious decision to stop spending time on 3rd party support so he can play with his rockets, this is something he will definitely want to address.

    • Re:OpenGL? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Applekid ( 993327 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:50PM (#19342727)
      Quite true. I also found the quote 'Our first task at id is as a single studio developer' to be quite telling in that regard, especially when, from my perspective, id games have become synonymous with "Game Graphics Engine Technical Demo++"

      With Unreal and Source taking strides, maybe technology is getting to a point where the return on investment of in-depth super genius work in a graphics engine is too low to justify.

      After all:
      Because of the nature of Moore's law, anything that an extremely clever graphics programmer can do at one point can be replicated by a merely competent programmer some number of years later.
      - John Carmack
      • I thought the Source engine started it's life as the Quake engine, and is supposed to still contain code from it.
        • No, the GoldSrc engine(HL1) did, and although Source was based on GoldSrc it has been radically changed since then.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Kelbear ( 870538 )
          That was the half-life engine, which did start development with the quake engine as their foundation and by release, 70% had been replaced.

          The Source engine was a new engine, I don't know how much had been transplanted from HL1, and if any of that had originated from id.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by KDR_11k ( 778916 )
        Yes but do you want your games to look like they're from two years ago? That won't fly on the PC and it won't fly on the console either (because the latter doesn't profit from moore's law regularly).

        We also know the target platform already [wiiliving.com].

        • Yes but do you want your games to look like they're from two years ago?
          No, I want them to look like they're from thirteen years ago. Not everybody requires 3D. Vive la SNES!
        • I think you're over-estimating the size of the 'hardcore FPS-playing upgrading-computer-every-two-weeks parents-basement' lobby. That niche gets smaller every day, these days it's gameplay that sells.
    • Not many titles have taken advantage of the source engine either. I think it is more of a general decline in the popularity of fps games in recent years than a failure of the engine. The technology is there, but the general gaming public have moved their obsession from unreal tournament and counterstrike to WoW.
    • There are native Linux/GL ports of every Unreal Tournament, and the original Unreal (apparently ported to the UT engine). It's true, UT2k4 had Direct3D and OpenGL renderers, using the d3d ones by default on Windows, but they do support OpenGL, and provide probably 95% of the functionality right away, and the other 5% (stencil shadows, for example) in patches.

      I don't know if Carmack is going OpenGL, but I do know that if he does, it will force the API to keep pace. That's what happened with Doom 3 -- it is O

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ildon ( 413912 )
      Valve? Huh? Unreal3 is the only engine of the 3 I've seen licensed in any meaningful quantity.
    • He has grumbled about the slow progression of this API in the past. Is now the time when he will make the jump to Direct3D? Maybe the slow progression doesn't matter as much any more; uptake of the latest version of DirectX seems to be extremely slow.
  • ...Now without even a name or description! Why waste time making up a name, story, and rigged-up screenshots for your new vaporware? Just claim that you're working on something new, but it's so new and revolutionary you can't talk about it! No hassles with release dates or feature lists...those id guys really ARE geniuses.

    "Mr. Carmack, how's your new game?"

    "People will bow to it."

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Paralizer ( 792155 )
      They don't give out details because it makes sense not to early in development. From what I've read from the book "Masters of Doom" [amazon.com], John Romero used to do a lot of boasting about new games before they were really ready to showcase. This became a problem because he would say stuff like, "well our game is going to do blah and blah", which is likely what they wanted at that stage in development. But maybe a few months down the road they decide that's not really want they wanted, now they have to deal with

  • Commander Keen? (Score:5, Funny)

    by Wise Dragon ( 71071 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:36PM (#19342517) Homepage
    I'd love to see a new Commander Keen game. That series was so much fun.

    • I'd love to see a new Commander Keen game. That series was so much fun.
      This made me laugh so hard I fell off my dinosaur. Owy, my head hurts...
    • That's exactly what I was thinking!
    • From TFA:

      ...it's not even Commander Keen.
      Sorry!

      • Re: (Score:1, Funny)

        by Anonymous Coward

        From TFA:

        ...it's not even Commander Keen.
        Sorry!
        Of course not... by now he's been promoted. Prepare for... ADMIRAL Keen!!!

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by ab0mb88 ( 541388 )
      FTA:
      it's not Doom, it's not Quake, it's not Wolfenstein, it's not Enemy Territory, it's not even Commander Keen.

      Finally the new version of Catacomb.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by KDR_11k ( 778916 )
      I think it was Hollenshead who said they'd make a sequel if they could get the rights back. Not sure about the person but it was an id employee so I guess they sold the rights (or didn't keep them).

  • Its really great! (Score:4, Insightful)

    by DrWho520 ( 655973 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:36PM (#19342531) Journal
    Hey everybody, we have something really great, but we cannot show you. We cannot even tell you any details. It is built on this amazing engine that is so amazing it is not even finished yet, so we really cannot show you anything. But it was designed and devoloped by this A-number one developer...the man is a fricken genius! Yeah, he did this awesome game you played four years ago.

    Nothing to see here...

    • Re:Its really great! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by DeltaSigma ( 583342 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:49PM (#19342719) Journal
      I gaurantee you, what happened here is gameindustry.biz asked for some statements regarding their next title, and id gave them a straight up answer. Gameindustry.biz considered this news-worthy. If you read the entire (and very short) article, you see Hollenshed say "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." In other words, this isn't an an announcement that id is making. They're not trying to start the hype machine. Gameindustry.biz just get over-excited about their "exclusive."

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Quila ( 201335 )
      Carmack's been known to write and throw away entire rendering engines overnight. This one must have pretty good potential if he's been sticking with it for a while.

  • "New Title" will probably rock (Score:4, Funny)

    by Richard McBeef ( 1092673 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:38PM (#19342549)
    I hope the don't fuck up "New Title II" though.
  • Wouldn't it be cool to see an id/Wii project?

  • Listen to Carmack on Archive.org (Score:5, Informative)

    by DeltaSigma ( 583342 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:44PM (#19342635) Journal
    John Carmack's keynotes from the last three QuakeCons are available here [archive.org]. You won't get any solid answers on their next title, but in the 2006 speech you can get some clues when John Carmack starts elaborating on his game design philosophies.

  • I guess you all just don't understand... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dteichman2 ( 841599 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:47PM (#19342685) Homepage
    I hope Id does something OTHER than an FPS game. The market for those seems to be getting pretty saturated. Imagine what they could do to an RTS with all their graphical godliness. Heck, how about an RPG. Maybe combine the best of two genres. I used to play a HL mod that had a "commander" who saw things from top-down and did the RTS stuff while everyone else was in FPS-mode (think BF2, but SciFi).
    • While I'd like to see a different genre from id on one hand, I'd also like to see their response to Halo and Gears of War. id is the original owner of the FPS format, but they're not owning recent FPS sales. They've gotten their artistic Doom 3 done-the-way-we-always-wanted-to-do-it title out. So perhaps they're readying some super-charged pure FPS revolution.

    • Re: (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I hope Id does something OTHER than an FPS game.

      Everyone does first-person or third-person shooters. The "second-person shooter" world is sorely lacking, and it is here that id will show its true genius.

      But I've said too much.
      • I'm holding out for third person singular neutral possessive. If anybody can do it, John Carmack can!
    • They also had a mod similar to this for one of the Quake games, although which name escapes me at the moment. In fact, it was a strictly two players RTS, just using quake assets. It was a neat proof-of-concept, but I don't believe it ever really caught on.

      On a side note, and I know hell would have frozen over at this point, but I would love to see them bring back the people from the Doom days. Obviously it would be in a limited fashion. I fired up Doom II the other day just to goof off with a friend tha
    • I think the mod you're referring to is Natural Selection [moddb.com]. If I'm not mistaken, the mod has been updated for HL2 as well.
    • I was with you until you mentioned RTS. I don't understand the attraction to that genre at all - as soon as the "RT" is added the "S" takes a huge fall IMO. If anything, I'd look for a first-person adventure that oozes atmosphere and begs for world interaction. Think Grim Fandango crossed with Myst, only a little more action-oriented. Unfortunately, I don't think id is up to the task of developing a good tale, so I'll have to wait until the (hypothetical) engine is licensed to someone else.
    • You mean natural selection right?
    • I used to play a HL mod that had a "commander" who saw things from top-down and did the RTS stuff while everyone else was in FPS-mode (think BF2, but SciFi).

      Tribes had this genre covered in 1998.

  • Ahem (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Aminion ( 896851 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @02:55PM (#19342813)
    Will id's new engine support bleeding edge features such as brightness? *ducks*
    • Don't give them any ideas! They'll do a game that's so bright all you can see is white! Then they'll decide it has to be a fucking trilogy and release a game that's all gray!
    • Quake 4 and Quake Wars don't seem to have a problem with being bright :P
    • Of course, they couldn't use the Hi-Def label unless it used over saturated lighting.
    • Make it brown. Real is brown. And dark.
      Add some full screen glow.
      Some more full screen glow.
      More glow!
      More glow!!
      MORE GLOW!!!
      Head asplodes.

    • Will id's new engine support bleeding edge features such as brightness? *ducks*


      (tounge firmly in cheek)

      Clearly, iD software nor its affiliates have control over the intelligence of its fan-base, so "no" is
      the most likely answer.

      (/TFIC)
  • The new title will be Sim Carmack. It's a simulation type game where you design some great 3d shooter games, and then do nothing but roll around in money for about 4 years.

    Well, they did say original, so it's all in realtime.
  • I know I'm ancient, but does anyone else remember when Carmack used to post on slashdot with some degree of regularity? And not just on id-related topics. Good times...
    • http://slashdot.org/~John+Carmack [slashdot.org]

      Yep... his posts were always great :)
      • And always modded +5! He either gets mod points for being John Carmack, or he has mastered the ability to post only when you have something truly insightful to say, and not just replying to make a clever joke.
    • I can't say that I remember that, but it doesn't seem too surprising. This weekend at the International Space Development Conference (I'm a space nerd, not a game nerd) we were able to organize a special student event with him (about 15 of us having a conversation with him about Armadillo stuff) and he was very friendly and great to talk to (he knows his shit too, which is really impressive for it just being a really expensive hobby.)

      Also, later, when some of my friends were sitting at their booth during s
    • That pretty neat. And here's a complete post from John Carmack:

      Thank you.

      John Carmack
      That got a +5 Interesting. You know you're somebody in the nerd world when you can do that on /. with just 2 words and your name.
  • http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=116699&cid=987 6672 [slashdot.org] "I am extremely proud of Doom 3. I think it is the best game we have ever made, and it exceeded all of my expectations. That is a rather trite phrase, but it is literally true -- I had a good set of expectations for how the game would turn out based on the technologies that it was built on, and it wound up being just plain better than that. We think a lot of people will like it. I don't follow gaming message boards, because, at its best, enterta

  • Major redundancy (Score:3, Informative)

    by RobNich ( 85522 ) on Thursday May 31, 2007 @09:55PM (#19347163) Homepage
    Read this posting from John Carmack in 2004. [slashdot.org]

    Seriously, htf is this story news? Aren't there enough decent submissions?

  • SPF (Score:2)

    by mwvdlee ( 775178 )
    After the First Person Shooter, and the Third Person Shooter, only one genre remains for Carmack to tackle; the Second Person Shooter! You'll be playing a demon from hell that's being hunted down by a few thousand space marines.

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