John Carmack

John D. Carmack II (born August 20, 1970) is a widely recognized figure in the video game industry. A prolific programmer, Carmack co-founded id Software, a computer game development company, in 1991.

Game programming

Softdisk in Shreveport, Louisiana hired Carmack, uniting him with John Romero and other future key members of id Software such as Adrian Carmack (not related). In 1990, while still at Softdisk, Carmack, Romero, and others created the first of the Commander Keen games, a series which was published by Apogee Software, under the shareware distribution model, from 1991 onwards. Afterwards, Carmack left Softdisk to co-found id Software, where he remains.

Related Topics:
Softdisk - Shreveport, Louisiana - John Romero - Id Software - Adrian Carmack - 1990 - Commander Keen - Apogee Software - Shareware - 1991

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Carmack's most notable programming ventures are in the area of first-person shooter games. His programming skills contributed to the development of seminal games of that genre: Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Quake, as well as their newer versions (including Doom 3 and the rest of the Quake series).

Related Topics:
First-person shooter - Wolfenstein 3D - Doom - Quake - Doom 3

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He has pioneered the use of many techniques in computer graphics, including binary space partitioning which Doom became the first game to use, surface caching which he invented for Quake, and Carmack's Reverse which he devised for Doom 3 (while the latter was not originally invented by him, he discovered it independently).

Related Topics:
Binary space partitioning - Surface caching - Carmack's Reverse

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Carmack's engines have also been licensed for use in other influential first person action shooter games such as Half-Life and Medal of Honor.

Related Topics:
Half-Life - Medal of Honor

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