Why John Carmack Believes in Mobile Games

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By Alexander Smith

When he’s not contributing to our blog, “Alexander Smith” is a well-respected journalist writing about the business of games for the industry’s leading trade publications, and the world’s most respected business outlets.  Stay tuned for more industry coverage from Alexander.

 

 

 

John Carmack has been pushing the boundaries of gaming technology since the Apple II. He perfected the 3-D graphics engine, and introduced the world to multiplayer deathmatch. His company, id Software, is currently completing their fifth generation of tools and technology—specifically designed to run games on next-gen consoles and high-end PCs and Macs.

 

And while Mr Carmack is one of the most technically respected game developers, the thing that excites him the most are games for cell phones. “I’m not a cell phone guy,” he admits. “I resisted getting one at all for years, and even now I rarely carry it.”

 

Mr Carmack recalls the time three years ago when he lost the previous, old cell phone. His wife bought him a new one. It had a nice colour screen, and came loaded with bad java games. He further recalls being almost morally indignant that “someone would make these really awful games on this platform.”

 

He recognized that the modern cell phone has more power than many of the earlier personal computers. Here was technology to push. So Mr Carmack’s next project was a cell phone game. It was a success, and now he has a new outlook on mobile games.

 

To wit, they are a proving ground. Major modern games take years to make, hundreds of developers, and millions of dollars. But the mobile scale allows for an individual to come up with a good idea, and execute on it without great risk.

 

Mr Carmack calls mobile games his ‘sneaky little plan’ for creating new properties, releasing them into the marketplace, and then developing them incrementally for larger and larger platforms with more complex development structures.

 

Besides the business, creative, and technical reasons, these games can be fun, too.

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