Quake 3 Source Code Coming, id 360 Title as Well

[bapenguin]

GameCloud (http://www.gamecloud.com/article.php?article_id=1068) sums up John Carmack's keynote address from Quake Con 05. Some very interesting things were mentioned. The Quake 3 Source code should be released sometime next week under the GPL. There was a lot of talk about the next gen consoles, and Carmack see Sony creating an open enviornment for developers (ie Homebrew....ironic huh?).

Much of the keynote speech was about Carmack's opinions of the next generation consoles, specifically the Playstation 3 and the Xbox 360 (the Revolution wasn't even mentioned). Carmack said that the original Xbox was easy to develop for thanks to solid dev tools and the Xbox 360 is the same way but that the PS3 will allow developers to get closer to the hardware performance. Carmack admitted that he has been spending some time working on developing id's next game on the Xbox 360 and said that their next internally created title will be released for the PC and consoles at or close to the same time
Very interesting about the open development of the PS3. Ashame Microsoft won't follow suit.

[Borys]

I wonder if the PS2 Linux kits were any successful? Anyone got any data how it sold?

And Q3 source sounds good. Time to "tenebrae" it, coders!

[Jeff]

That title is deceptive. I was utterly confused at the possibility of Quake 3 being redone on the Half-Life 2 engine. Although, now that I think about it, the idea is intriguing. Hmm.

[saneman]

I wouldn't call the title deceptive as much as I'd call Valve's naming of their engine utterly retarded.

[MasterKwan]

Yeah I was thinking the same thing, Carmack with Valve, who would have thunk it.

The interview overview made me kind of sad. It's like the end of an era. When Carmack says "I'm not a physics guy" it made me think he's feeling old and is stuck in the rut of being an "graphics engine guy". Now that graphics are pretty much here, you'd think he might branch out into something new. I'm pretty happy with the state of current graphics. I want physics and interactivity with objects in games to emulate real life.

Then when I read he sold off the last Ferrari, yeah it's the end of an era.

[bapenguin]

k...now it says Source Code

[Borys]

Then when I read he sold off the last Ferrari, yeah it's the end of an era.

And code his next title with consoles in mind.

End of an era it is.

[Xaerin]

When asked by an audience member, Carmack admitted to being a fan of the Sony PSP and also said that id has talked about creating a PSP game of its own although no other info was mentioned.

Hexen 3!! Or Commander Keen 3d! Or would that be H3x3n and Command3r K33n?

[Hellstorm]

Hehehe... PC gaming...dying slowly every day. Soon it will be a one console nation, under Sony, indivisble, with liberty and Firefox for all.

[Wonka]

Its odd, I saw a very similar (but much more thorough and also more interesting) kind of article last night on gamespy which made it sound like overall Carmack preferred the X360 even though he also expressed the same opinion about open platforms. Here is the link in case you want to read it:

http://www.gamespy.com/articles/641/641662p1.html

I always enjoy reading what John has to say. What I got out was:
1) He likes the X360 a lot.
2) He feels that in terms of horsepower the PS3 and X360 will be very very close.
3) He likes the idea that Sony is throwing around of making their platform more open, and doubts that MS would do anything like that.

The one thing I disagreed with was #3. I understand the benefits of open source software and I am a fan too. But an open platform is what killed Atari (anyone else remember the ET game). In contrast the closed platform console was the single greatest contribution to gaming that Nintendo ever made. Without it, console gaming might have died in the 80s. I think on this point Mr. Carmack needs to just think a bit more about the history before advocating a totally open system in which anyone can publish. I think that for "openness" to reach consoles (and for Johns vision to be realized), a tiered model needs to be in place. So consumers know when they are buying a no-name (meaning standard-less) game that just might be the next ET. That way, the market wont be flooded by crappy games, and the AAA titles will still have some shelf space to ensure that the market survives all the openness he is proposing.

[Hellstorm]

Look, the only think Carmack should worry about isn't coding, isn't which next gen console to support, it's to find fucking gameplay and manage some how, probably through a hack, to implement it into their next game.

[Maskatron]

I understand the benefits of open source software and I am a fan too. But an open platform is what killed Atari (anyone else remember the ET game).

Bad example. ET was a first-party game (http://www.snopes.com/business/market/atari.asp).

[Wonka]

Ok, that was maybe not the best example. But I maintain that my point still stands:

I don't think that it really matters WHO made ET. It's still true that it was the complete lack of standards that killed Atari. There were a ton of crappy games (of which ET was a notable example) that flooded the marketplace and crashed consumer confidence in the 80s. Opening the floodgates for "anyone who wants to" to make games (as Carmack has suggested) could easily recreate that very bad scenario. Ironically, the things he complains about in the article (about needing a license and having the game approved by the console maker etc.) are the very things that Nintendo created to save the game industry in the 80s. By having high standards, and holding everyone else to those standards, Nintendo saved the business from its own greed. Now since then, they have often gone a little overboard from time to time and alienated the 3rd parties, but that's another story...

[mister_slim]

Sony isn't talking about opening the licensing of games to anyone, but rather opening up more of the hardware to developers. If they will actually do anything we don't know.

[Chandler]

Sony isn't talking about opening the licensing of games to anyone, but rather opening up more of the hardware to developers. If they will actually do anything we don't know.

no I'm pretty sure Carmack meant Sony was toying with the idea of open games licensing. Because in the keynote he rebuttled himself saying "though I know why game consoles have to do that, which is to subsidize the cost of the console hardware itself".

[alienchild]

strange, I spoke to one of the guys who ported Doom to Dreamcast earlier today and he mentioned that Quake 3 was getting ported (homebrew ofc.) to the PSP already. Guess I misunderstood...

[ElectricMonk]

And code his next title with consoles in mind.

End of an era it is.

doom 3 was coded with consoles in mind.


and wasn't nintendo successfully sued by their 3rd party devs about being so closed-platform they were breaking several anti-competitive laws?