For anyone who is interested in the history, I really recommend the book "Masters of Doom". It covers the early lives of the two John's, the formation of id, development of their major games, then...
For anyone who is interested in the history, I really recommend the book "Masters of Doom". It covers the early lives of the two John's, the formation of id, development of their major games, then the eventual breakup, and the Daikatana debacle.
He also just released a new book called Doom Guy: Life in First Person which is fascinating due to Romero having a condition that allows him to recall his own experiences perfectly (hyperthymesia).
He also just released a new book called Doom Guy: Life in First Person which is fascinating due to Romero having a condition that allows him to recall his own experiences perfectly (hyperthymesia).
Huh that fact makes it even more interesting that Action Button, who I believe has the same condition, created this massive review video of Doom. Funnily, I didn't think he mentioned that John...
Huh that fact makes it even more interesting that Action Button, who I believe has the same condition, created this massive review video of Doom. Funnily, I didn't think he mentioned that John also had this condition.
Romero's confirmation in a tweet came after the video was posted in 2020. Romero seems like someone who might toss it around as a biographical thing, but I don't know if he put a word to it before...
Romero's confirmation in a tweet came after the video was posted in 2020. Romero seems like someone who might toss it around as a biographical thing, but I don't know if he put a word to it before then in anything he wrote.
As an aside about hyperthymesia - it's also kind of a nebulous condition/diagnosis to have, right? I started looking around about it years ago due to Tim Roger's writing style, which seem very much colored by living with it. According to the sources for the Wikipedia page, there are only 62 people officially diagnosed with it in the world in 2016/2021- so do Rogers or Romero have it, as it is defined? It sounds like there isn't really a central agreement on how to test or diagnose people easily, so that'd kinda be up to them to "prove" they have it. But I can't imagine risking being told you don't have it really benefits you when some of their fame may be due to it, or a slight to their character to be denied a diagnosis.
Still, Rogers seems to pretty consistently convey some examples, and with Romero I found anecdotally that he's very similarly good with numbers and dates. Whether they do or don't "have" it, their communication does seem to be influenced by that fixation on recall - so diagnosis or not I'm interested in Romero's biography.
I don’t know about Tim Rogers but, at least with Romero, there’s been enough verification of the accuracy of his memory and the specific context and condition that the memories are specific to...
I don’t know about Tim Rogers but, at least with Romero, there’s been enough verification of the accuracy of his memory and the specific context and condition that the memories are specific to him, as opposed to photographic memory, that it’s all but verified. It’s similar to Marilu Henner, who also has the condition, in that she’s never been tested for it officially but has displayed it so obviously that there’s little doubt*. The fact that they also can only recall memories that they have experienced personally makes it distinct from other photographic memory conditions. It really makes their auto-biographies exceptionally rare in how vivid the recall is.
*Edit: Marilu has actually been officially diagnosed since initially coming out publicly about her condition.
Thank you for the introduction to Tim Rogers. That was one of the most fascinating, disheartening, and lovely things I’ve ever read. It’s overly detailed in such a weird way and I can’t stop...
Thank you for the introduction to Tim Rogers. That was one of the most fascinating, disheartening, and lovely things I’ve ever read. It’s overly detailed in such a weird way and I can’t stop thinking about it.
I think the most important quote of that whole article, which really explains the difference between most games of today vs games from the past, is this : "We were making games that we wanted to...
I think the most important quote of that whole article, which really explains the difference between most games of today vs games from the past, is this :
"We were making games that we wanted to play," he said. "We weren't worried about audience. We were the audience. We played every game on all the systems back then. We were consumers, and we knew what we wanted to make."
So many titles today seem so derivative of one another and don't seem to take a lot of chances. The industry has become too expensive and competitive to take that approach anymore, outside of the indie space. Guess it's no surprise then that a lot of the most popular games of the last 10 years have been games that came out as mods of other games. Battle Royale genre, has the mod for ArmA III to thank for its existence. MOBAs like DotA and LoL come from WarCraft III custom games. Overwatch was an evolution from Team Fortress 2, which came from Team Fortress Classic, which came from Quake Team Fortress which was a mod for Quake. Call of Duty is basically just new bells and whistles from their original formula all the way back to the first WWII Call of Duty game, which was basically a WWII skinned Quake 3. The game is still fast paced and feels a lot like Quake 3 even all these years later.
Only games I can think of that are popular today that didn't have a modding predecessor are extraction shooters and Soulslikes such as Elden Ring. Those have become quite popular, but not sure if they have any roots in small-studio/independent passion projects.
I'd argue FromSoftware's foray into video games was driven by indie passion. They were originally founded in the 80s selling business software, but worked on video games in their downtime,...
I'd argue FromSoftware's foray into video games was driven by indie passion. They were originally founded in the 80s selling business software, but worked on video games in their downtime, eventually deciding to actually sell one. Inspired by dungeon crawlers, their first game was King's Field, released in 1994, quickly after the PS1 hit shelves. While King's Field would go on to total some four releases, Demon Souls was its spiritual successor.
perhaps that explains the quality to their games, then! They have always been a gem in the gaming space and one of the most popular developers, ever since Dark Souls 1 really blew up and got more...
perhaps that explains the quality to their games, then! They have always been a gem in the gaming space and one of the most popular developers, ever since Dark Souls 1 really blew up and got more people into their games.
For anyone who is interested in the history, I really recommend the book "Masters of Doom". It covers the early lives of the two John's, the formation of id, development of their major games, then the eventual breakup, and the Daikatana debacle.
He also just released a new book called Doom Guy: Life in First Person which is fascinating due to Romero having a condition that allows him to recall his own experiences perfectly (hyperthymesia).
Huh that fact makes it even more interesting that Action Button, who I believe has the same condition, created this massive review video of Doom. Funnily, I didn't think he mentioned that John also had this condition.
Romero's confirmation in a tweet came after the video was posted in 2020. Romero seems like someone who might toss it around as a biographical thing, but I don't know if he put a word to it before then in anything he wrote.
As an aside about hyperthymesia - it's also kind of a nebulous condition/diagnosis to have, right? I started looking around about it years ago due to Tim Roger's writing style, which seem very much colored by living with it. According to the sources for the Wikipedia page, there are only 62 people officially diagnosed with it in the world in 2016/2021- so do Rogers or Romero have it, as it is defined? It sounds like there isn't really a central agreement on how to test or diagnose people easily, so that'd kinda be up to them to "prove" they have it. But I can't imagine risking being told you don't have it really benefits you when some of their fame may be due to it, or a slight to their character to be denied a diagnosis.
Still, Rogers seems to pretty consistently convey some examples, and with Romero I found anecdotally that he's very similarly good with numbers and dates. Whether they do or don't "have" it, their communication does seem to be influenced by that fixation on recall - so diagnosis or not I'm interested in Romero's biography.
I don’t know about Tim Rogers but, at least with Romero, there’s been enough verification of the accuracy of his memory and the specific context and condition that the memories are specific to him, as opposed to photographic memory, that it’s all but verified. It’s similar to Marilu Henner, who also has the condition, in that she’s never been tested for it officially but has displayed it so obviously that there’s little doubt*. The fact that they also can only recall memories that they have experienced personally makes it distinct from other photographic memory conditions. It really makes their auto-biographies exceptionally rare in how vivid the recall is.
*Edit: Marilu has actually been officially diagnosed since initially coming out publicly about her condition.
Thank you for the introduction to Tim Rogers. That was one of the most fascinating, disheartening, and lovely things I’ve ever read. It’s overly detailed in such a weird way and I can’t stop thinking about it.
All of his Action Button and older Kotaku stuff is great if you can stomach his laborious, maximal style.
I think the most important quote of that whole article, which really explains the difference between most games of today vs games from the past, is this :
"We were making games that we wanted to play," he said. "We weren't worried about audience. We were the audience. We played every game on all the systems back then. We were consumers, and we knew what we wanted to make."
So many titles today seem so derivative of one another and don't seem to take a lot of chances. The industry has become too expensive and competitive to take that approach anymore, outside of the indie space. Guess it's no surprise then that a lot of the most popular games of the last 10 years have been games that came out as mods of other games. Battle Royale genre, has the mod for ArmA III to thank for its existence. MOBAs like DotA and LoL come from WarCraft III custom games. Overwatch was an evolution from Team Fortress 2, which came from Team Fortress Classic, which came from Quake Team Fortress which was a mod for Quake. Call of Duty is basically just new bells and whistles from their original formula all the way back to the first WWII Call of Duty game, which was basically a WWII skinned Quake 3. The game is still fast paced and feels a lot like Quake 3 even all these years later.
Only games I can think of that are popular today that didn't have a modding predecessor are extraction shooters and Soulslikes such as Elden Ring. Those have become quite popular, but not sure if they have any roots in small-studio/independent passion projects.
I'd argue FromSoftware's foray into video games was driven by indie passion. They were originally founded in the 80s selling business software, but worked on video games in their downtime, eventually deciding to actually sell one. Inspired by dungeon crawlers, their first game was King's Field, released in 1994, quickly after the PS1 hit shelves. While King's Field would go on to total some four releases, Demon Souls was its spiritual successor.
perhaps that explains the quality to their games, then! They have always been a gem in the gaming space and one of the most popular developers, ever since Dark Souls 1 really blew up and got more people into their games.