Bethesda parent company purchases iD Software

[Queasy]

Kotaku is reporting that ZeniMax Media, the parent company of Bethesda, is purchasing iD Software of Doom and Wolfenstein fame.

In an interview with Kotaku, id co-founder John Carmack, id CEO Todd Hollenshead and ZeniMax CEO Robert Altman said the purchase will change none of the principles or principals of id and Bethesda but will allow id to grow like it never has before. The purchase does not affect plans for previously announced games from id that are slated for release through other publishers, including the Activision-backed Wolfenstein and the EA Partners-planned Rage.

Why did id sell?

"We're really getting kind of tired competing with our own publishers in terms of how our titles will be featured," Carmack said. "And we've really gotten more IPs than we've been able to take advantage of. And working with other companies hasn't been working out as spectacularly as it could. So the idea of actually becoming a publisher and merging Bethesda and Zenimax on there [is ideal.] It would be hard to imagine a more complementary relationship. They are tripe A, top-of-the-line in what they do in the RPGs. And they have no overlap with all the things we do in the FPSes."

...

The goal, explained Carmack, is for id to handle all of its own IPs. "We can build the pipeline and have a regular pipeline of releases."

 

[RyanPaulShaffer]

Is id even relevant any more? Have they released a game this century that matters? I know Doom 3, some Quake derivatives, etc., but those games weren't all that great or popular.

Don't get me wrong, id was great in the 90s, with Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Quake, etc. But now it's like...id? /shrug

 

[DaveSimmons]

Unreal is the hot and (texture) poppin' engine for games, so Id has even lost that crown.

It's been years since I've been excited by an Id game, though Carmack is still the Geek god of 3D engine design.

 

[erwos]

id is relevant as a technology developer, to be certain - look at how much money Epic has made off UE3! Bethesda/Zenimax wants a cut of the pie, and id is one way to get there. There are also the obvious benefits to having guys like Carmack writing your engine for your own games...

The reason that id doesn't seem so terribly relevant right now is because the last engine they wrote, the Doom 3 engine, was not really designed for consoles, and it got released just as consoles were really taking off. From everything they've said, they're not making that mistake with the Rage engine. In the same vein, Epic clearly planned for UE3 to be a console game engine, and it worked out very well for them.

 

[EvilComputer92]

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
Unreal is the hot and (texture) poppin' engine for games, so Id has even lost that crown.

It's been years since I've been excited by an Id game, though Carmack is still the Geek god of 3D engine design.

Not really. I'd say he was in the 90s or so but he's been overtaken by Tim Sweeny since the first Unreal engine was released.

Even Doom 3 when it first came out was already surpassed by Far Cry. In terms of pure technical prowess, it's probably Crytek leading the pack.

Even the screenshots from Rage using the latest Idtech have been mediocre compared to what other companies have been putting out.

 

[dguy6789]

Crytek only has the lead in outdoor environments. Unreal Engine 3 looks better and runs better for indoor locations.

 

[EvilComputer92]

Originally posted by: dguy6789
Crytek only has the lead in outdoor environments. Unreal Engine 3 looks better and runs better for indoor locations.

Take a look at the Core level in Crysis, where you enter the alien mothership. It certainly is far ahead of anything I've seen in a UE3 game.