Carmack, John

1970–

Game Designer

John Carmack is one of the leading computer-game designers of the late twentieth century. His pioneering work on 3D game design led to the invention of the “first-person shooter” genre, exemplified by such popular games as Doom and Quake. His company, id Software, developed shareware and Internet distribution channels, revolutionizing the ways in which computer games were sold.

Born in 1970, Carmack grew up in Kansas City, Missouri, and knew early on that programming was his calling. After spending a year in a juvenile home following a brush with the law, Carmack attended computer-science classes for a few semesters at the University of Missouri–Kansas City. He dropped out to pursue contract-programming jobs, then accepted a position at Softdisk, a software-publishing firm in Louisiana. There, he met John Romero, Tom Hall, and Adrian Carmack (no relation), and together they created the first Commander Keen game, which was released as shareware in 1990. Following the success of this game, the group left Softdisk to found id Software in 1991.

In May 1992, id released Wolfenstein 3-D, a hit that is considered by many to be the first true first-person shooter. Players navigated a three-dimensional environment of rooms and hallways from a first-person perspective, wielding a weapon that appeared at the bottom of the screen. Game play consisted of finding one's way through various levels while killing Nazi guards and attack dogs. Following this success, on December 10, 1993, id released Doom, a frenetically immersive and violent improvement upon Wolfenstein.

The release of Doom marks a turning point in the history of computer gaming for several reasons. More than 15 million copies of Doom have been downloaded from the Internet, making it one of the most popular games of all time. Doom was short on narrative; players roamed a military base blasting various types of aliens into oblivion. With its realistic floor and ceiling textures, Doom added greatly to the sense of embodied movement that defines the first-person shooter genre. Carmack also released portions of Doom's source code to the public, which allowed its dedicated fan base the opportunity to modify levels and graphics to add their own personal touches. One such modification replaced the sinister-looking aliens with purple dinosaurs like Barney. The practice of making source code available to players has been a key element in the overwhelming popularity of Carmack's games.

In 1996, id released Quake, which further advanced the genre. Along with ever-improving graphic realism, Quake allowed multiplayer gaming over the Internet, so that several people could play with (or against) each other in the same environment. This feature contributed to the immense popularity of online gaming, featuring players going head-to-head in “death matches.”

Aside from their pioneering graphic realism and online interactivity, Carmack's games have also been marketed and distributed in revolutionary ways. Both Wolfenstein and Doom were released in free, downloadable shareware versions that contained only the first level; once players were hooked, they could pay for the rest of the game. Dubbed the “crack cocaine model” of distribution, it generated a huge amount of interest and word-of-mouth buzz around a game, boosting sales. When the first episode of Doom was released on University of Wisconsin servers, the rush of downloads crashed the entire system. Similarly, Quake was packaged as a $10 disk that allowed access only to the first level; the disk contained the rest of the game in an encrypted format, the key to which could be purchased by credit card. This allowed Quake to be distributed much more widely in convenience stores, which would not usually have carried $50 computer games.

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