John Romero, Adrian Carmack return to FPS development

John Romero and his fellow iD Software co-founder Adrian Carmack are returning to the FPS genre they helped to popularise with classics such as Doom and Quake, launching a Kickstarter today for a project known as Blackroom, which promises to harken back to many of the aspects which personified those early titles.

The pair's company, Nightwork Games, aims to have the game ready for winter 2018, aiming for an initial Kickstarter target of $700,000.

"It is incredible to work with Adrian again," said Romero. "We're developing exactly the type of game we think a lot of shooter fans want. It's the type of shooter we're known for, and the type of game we love to play ourselves. It's a skillful shooter, from movement to weapon and map mastery."

Blackroom certainly has some room for creative manoeuvering. Set against a backdrop of a fictional world-leading company in dangerously lifelike holographic simulations, Blackroom has the freedom to build environments unconstrained by narrative consistency, promising transitions from medieval castles to Victorian mansions and the Wild West.

"It's been great working with John again, and we're really setting out to produce a visceral FPS," added Adrian Carmack. "Because of the Blackroom's setting, we have a lot of freedom to create environments that players might not expect in an FPS. Blackroom technology lets its users enter just about any universe imaginable, and gives them the power to alter the world. That gives me lots of artistic freedom."