RIP Id Software

[Nidstang]

I am absolutely devastated by this news. DOOM is my all-time favorite game franchise. I love Quake. I love Wolfenstein. 136 employees fired from Id Software out of around 180. All of the key engineers and artists. Ex-employees indicating that Id will now be allocated to a support company, and will convert over from Id Tech (one of the best gaming engines ever designed) to Unreal Engine (ugh).
All this done THE DAY before the DOOM The Dark Ages Revelations DLC came out. The year of the 10th anniversary of DOOM 2016. The 30th anniversary of Quake. One month before Quakecon. I genuinely cannot believe Xbox is this stupid. I'm so angry and depressed about this. We'll likely never get another DOOM or Quake ever again, and if we do, it will be a hollow shell of what Id is capable of.

One of the absolute best studios in the industry, with decades worth of talent, and legendary status IPs destroyed by corporate greed and stupidity.

Update: 136 workers have been laid off at id Software

The news comes with Xbox preparing to 'reset' its video game division by eliminating 3,200 roles.

www.gamedeveloper.com

https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/id-software-dev-claims-its-been-relegated-to-support-studio-size-as-136-layoffs-confirmed/

 

[MorriganW0lf]

It is sad to see them "go" like this, I remember playing Doom 1 as a kid and being scared but intrigued by it, when i was a teen i remember trying to play Doom 3 at 2 am on my shitty laptop back when it was new. Most of my formative gaming memories have Doom in them. This is trully the timeline where everything is bad.

 

[gwardojones]

I almost never play AAA games anymore, but the new DOOM games (and even the ports of the older id games) were a bright spot in an industry full of greed and disregard for consumers and devs. I'm not shocked that this is happening, and I'm frankly expecting most of the other devs under Microsoft to eventually follow suit, but this definitely hurts.

 

[bratish]

doomed...

 

[nyka]

Really feels like we're heading towards another crash of some kind; I mean indies continue to knock out great games; but the AAA and even AA markets might be dinosaurs of a fading age.

 

[SamanthaSamantha's icon]

Thanks for all the slaughter, ID.

We had fun.

 

[Sumer_Singh_3]

Ionstorm went out with more dignity man. At least you could say they went out making games they loved like Anachronox and Thief Deadly Shadows. Despite embarrassments like Daikatana, all their other games were either game changing masterpieces like Deus Ex, decent games Invisible War and genuinely underrated or fun games like previously mentioned two. Even at their worst games like Daikatana, there was a passion, and they eventually fell, but not without attempting to do what their hearts desired. They recieved a death. A glorious death. Yes, it is death nonethless but they got to walk out with an honor and saying they did what they did even if they failed.

This on the other hand, you just wish this was death. This is not death, this is a vegetative coma where Id is now being sold to pleasure the lowest paying necrophile. They are going to be a support studio chugging away at the Call of Duty mines or at best case scenario, make UE slop sequels to Doom. It is a fate worse than death. You can hear the ECG machine beeping and you know the right thing to do is to pull the plug and let the dead rest, but instead, the name will be defiled as it goes on until they die with a wimper and not a bang, with all their honor stripped off them.

 

[Lena CE]

Punished for making 3 of the best games of the past decade with a gutting. Such a joke...

 

[Sumer_Singh_3]

Punished for making 3 of the best games of the past decade with a gutting. Such a joke...

I mean, Tango made two of the best games of this xbox generation and their reward was not a bonus but a firing. It was the gaming equivalent of Alan Turing being rewarded for saving people's lives with a court sentence. So I haven't expected smart decisions from this company for past three years to be honest.

 

[Neb Lleb]

I am absolutely devastated by this news. DOOM is my all-time favorite game franchise. I love Quake. I love Wolfenstein. 136 employees fired from Id Software out of around 180. All of the key engineers and artists. Ex-employees indicating that Id will now be allocated to a support company, and will convert over from Id Tech (one of the best gaming engines ever designed) to Unreal Engine (ugh).
All this done THE DAY before the DOOM The Dark Ages Revelations DLC came out. The year of the 10th anniversary of DOOM 2016. The 30th anniversary of Quake. One month before Quakecon. I genuinely cannot believe Xbox is this stupid. I'm so angry and depressed about this. We'll likely never get another DOOM or Quake ever again, and if we do, it will be a hollow shell of what Id is capable of.

One of the absolute best studios in the industry, with decades worth of talent, and legendary status IPs destroyed by corporate greed and stupidity.

Update: 136 workers have been laid off at id Software

The news comes with Xbox preparing to 'reset' its video game division by eliminating 3,200 roles.

www.gamedeveloper.com

https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/id-software-dev-claims-its-been-relegated-to-support-studio-size-as-136-layoffs-confirmed/

TBH, when I played Doom: The Dark Ages, I didn't know it would be Id's swan song. But here we are. Even under new management, Xbox is still as stupid as it was under Phil Spencer. I don't know when the industry crash will finally cause damage, but it can't come soon enough.

 

[seaglass]

Not much I can add to this except to say shame on Microsoft. They don't even have bad sales figures as an excuse here - Doom: The Dark Ages was well-received. They treat legendary games studios like cheap toys you can just throw away when you're bored with them.

 

[WitchDetective]

As much as I had my conflicting feelings with the new Doom titles, it's so abundantly clear how much of a misstep for Microsoft this is. Literally what companies do they even have left to make games for them now? Mojang?

 

[Blamhammer]

Need to be reminded that the decision makers and executives are the kinds of people who dismissed the arts and the study of them during higher education.
Doesn't matter how good a product is, all they care about is if it makes more money every year.

 

[MajorMachina]

 

[Zeo]

Well, seems that only fan mods/games of DOOM and Quake are the only thing fans can look for in the future

Shame of them for doing something like this

 

[MajorMachina]

Well, seems that only fan mods/games of DOOM and Quake are the only thing fans can look for in the future

Shame of them for doing something like this

thank god, Id released the Modding tools for eternal.

 

[NeonKnights]

This is sad to see. Makes me want to go play some Catacomb 3-D.
Don't worry though a Doom live service game is probably in production, though I hope not.

 

[lestagio]

Id has done so much for the gaming industry. They revolutionized FPS games with Doom, then did it again with Quake. Practically every game has been of amazing quality, and the games in the "new" Doom trilogy are all insanely good (well I haven't played The Dark Ages yet, but I've heard great things), especially Eternal, which was also very optimized, great engine, and all around just great design.

It's not to say there will NEVER be another Doom game, but 136 out of 180, or about 76% of the studio cut is actually infuriating. The week or two has NOT been good for gaming, between Sony doing all of their bullshit, and then Microsoft doing all of this bullshit. It's so upsetting seeing a medium I've loved for decades getting treated this way by some greedy CEOs. We still have PC, but AI has made it hard for people to afford and upgrade. Indie games are a lot of what's left— sure, we've had indie games as a major force for a decade now, but sometimes I really do want to play something with a high budget that looks and plays spectacularly and it sucks that that hardly exists anymore.

 

[Vardalis]

The week or two has NOT been good for gaming, between Sony doing all of their bullshit, and then Microsoft doing all of this bullshit.

Just waiting on Nintendo to start up their shit again. Maybe they'll sue another slew of ROM sites. Go after another indie dev. Jack up the prices of the Switch 1 and 2 to the stratosphere. The skies are the limit.

 

[Hsp_Kolo_HsP]

I am absolutely devastated by this news. DOOM is my all-time favorite game franchise. I love Quake. I love Wolfenstein. 136 employees fired from Id Software out of around 180. All of the key engineers and artists. Ex-employees indicating that Id will now be allocated to a support company, and will convert over from Id Tech (one of the best gaming engines ever designed) to Unreal Engine (ugh).
All this done THE DAY before the DOOM The Dark Ages Revelations DLC came out. The year of the 10th anniversary of DOOM 2016. The 30th anniversary of Quake. One month before Quakecon. I genuinely cannot believe Xbox is this stupid. I'm so angry and depressed about this. We'll likely never get another DOOM or Quake ever again, and if we do, it will be a hollow shell of what Id is capable of.

One of the absolute best studios in the industry, with decades worth of talent, and legendary status IPs destroyed by corporate greed and stupidity.

Update: 136 workers have been laid off at id Software

The news comes with Xbox preparing to 'reset' its video game division by eliminating 3,200 roles.

www.gamedeveloper.com

https://www.videogameschronicle.com/news/id-software-dev-claims-its-been-relegated-to-support-studio-size-as-136-layoffs-confirmed/

I am not surprised, Dark Ages underperformed from what I've heard with less than 1 mil. copies sold.

id wasn't perfect (locking DooM: DA into RTX and Quake Champions as a whole) but gutting it like this feels wrong.

Post automatically merged: Thursday at 8:29 PM

TBH, when I played Doom: The Dark Ages, I didn't know it would be Id's swan song. But here we are. Even under new management, Xbox is still as stupid as it was under Phil Spencer. I don't know when the industry crash will finally cause damage, but it can't come soon enough.

The damage is already here and was here ever since the massive layoffs in the industry started around late 2023, the big wigs at Xbox outside Phil and Sarah got off easy and everyone else got fucked.

 

[diet_orange]

Damn, and here I thought Microsoft couldn't have treated any other company under their care worse than they did Rare

 

[SamanthaSamantha's icon]

Ionstorm went out with more dignity man.

Totally — they were even working on an entirely new game called "Project X" (I could never find any info about what it was gonna be) before its personnel got pulled and sent to work on finishing Anachronox because the situation was chaotic and EIDOS were not pleased, but you are completely right!

 

[Mechablade-X]

Rip Id Tech engine, that powered many games and total convertions :(

 

[SamanthaSamantha's icon]

Rip Id Tech engine, that powered many games and total convertions :(

And it was probably the most beautifully optimized piece of tech ever coded — we don't talk about this enough, but it was seriously impressive... it could run on almost anything with barely any tweaks on the code. It could get decent performance out of toaster machines. It could squeeze every available MHz and still deliver a satisfying experience with barely any drawbacks... and people have been building upon that foundation for years and years.

 

[lestagio]