Tom’s Guide has an excellent (and very lengthy) interview with John Carmack that avoids simply spruiking the upcoming Rage running on iD’s new iD Tech 5 game engine and instead discusses more general computing topics. Carmack’s not pulling too many punches, either.
The interview’s well worth the full read, but to grab just a few quotes at random:
Carmack on Intel’s often derided internal graphics solution:
“The exciting, or interesting, segment really is at the low end. Intel integrated graphics parts have been the butt of a joke for many years — they’re just not something that you could consider using for games. But right now, with Intel’s current generation of integrated graphics parts, they have very good feature parity and they’re fully programmable.”
Or where he sits on the Android-versus-iPhone fence:
“The Android phones that I’ve played with didn’t displace my iPhone; I’m not carrying an Android phone with me, so I don’t have a lot of the personal push like I did with the iPhone. And when I did download the SDK, installed Eclipse and ran a couple of sample apps, it just didn’t grab me.”
Or where tablets and phones will go in relation to consoles next year:
“There’s been incorrect hyperbole about the power of these devices, where people are saying that they have console-level performance. The iPad 2 has about half the performance power, and that’s a ballpark estimate. But that does mean that mobile devices coming out, certainly next year, will be flat out more powerful”
I could go on and on, but you’re better off reading the whole thing yourself. It’s certainly eye opening seeing a top-level developer open up about where he sees the state of the PC and mobile industry right now.
[Tom’s Guide]
Andrew
Wednesday, August 24, 2011 at 12:09 PMI use to love this guy, but what has he done recently? and more so since his early success with doom & quake, his let all this fame get to his head..
I haven’t read this entire interview, but the general feeling I get from his last few interviews is this ‘know it all, superiority’..
So yeah, getting over mr. carmack opinions…
Mike
Wednesday, August 24, 2011 at 1:13 PMThis. Unfortunately the new Oxford dictionary would define him as “Prick – slang , derogatory an obnoxious or despicable man”
Cameron
Wednesday, August 24, 2011 at 1:41 PMI’ve always found his games kinda so-so, I mean Quake and Doom were famous for being Quake and Doom, it’s just expected you like them.
But the guy knows his stuff that’s for sure. Not many people are building engines these days, so when one of the people who still goes about it and knows what they’re doing speaks up, I find it wise to listen. At the end of the day, it’s the guys who make these engines that direct where games go over the next x years (although strangely, probably NOT id any more because of their stance of not licensing their id tech 5 engine).
Namarrgon
Wednesday, August 24, 2011 at 4:49 PM+1. Carmack has earned his lifetime achievement award by driving the early games industry more than pretty much anyone, in so many different areas, and deserves respect even if he sits on his arse forever more.
Oh, and he makes rockets too.
ozoneocean
Wednesday, August 24, 2011 at 1:02 PMFrom the quotes he pretty much has the same things to say as anybody else whoever comments on such things. Fairly bland and anodyne. Makes me wonder at the title here.
James
Wednesday, August 24, 2011 at 2:15 PMi am disgusted by the comments, carmack – so so, is that all you can come up with – on your knees and show some friggin respect – how many companies making money off his generosity, hes an inovator – hes confident about what he does – doesnt make him cocky – people like you out to hurt him – where would the world be without his contributions, perhaps some of his games are hit and miss – amazing how easy people shitcan someone when they havent done anything in a while – check out rage if only for the tech – i think you should have a look at yourself – what a joke
Andrew
Wednesday, August 24, 2011 at 5:12 PMJames: Not everyone is going to share your opinion. Deal with it.
I respected his earlier work, I loved him as a kid growing up… I understand how innovative he was back then. But now?? I don’t feel it anymore. I think his being left behind in the tech space and guys like Tim Sweeney are doing some really great stuff & at a much faster rate without acting like such a d!ck in the process.
I still want to listen to what JC says, as I wouldn’t of clicked on this article if I didn’t care, but my opinion is his still riding off the royalties from 10 years ago and has just become obnoxious since.
Disco_box
Wednesday, August 24, 2011 at 8:04 PMHere here.
To the “Oh he hasn’t done anything recently, who the f does he think he is” crowd. Why is he a prick? Because he has a based opinion on experience and talent? Because, he knows what he is talking about? Seriously? You are going to ignore his past as that doesn’t make him relevant now, even though he has coded numerous games since Doom and Quake? Go check his releases.
ID is about to release Rage which runs on an engine he coded a majority by himself. He knows about the iPhone because the engines for the Wolf, Doom and Rage games are his babies. In short, the man is relevant and worthy of respect. Cliffy B on the other hand…
God damn Trolls, go do something useful.