John Carmack exits id Software for Oculus Rift [UPDATE]

No, you’re not hallucinating. John Carmack, creator of first-person shooters and dabbler in rocket science, has left id Software to join VR company Oculus Rift where he’ll serve as chief technology officer.

Carmack was a founder of the game studio that created Quake, Doom and Wolfenstein. He believes VR will have a ”huge impact” in the coming years, and wants to be upfront.

UPDATE: Apparently John Carmack is not actually leaving id Software, as he’ll ”continue to provide leadership for our games in development,” tweets id.

”Happy to say @id_aa_carmack is not leaving id & will continue to provide leadership for our games in development,” reads the full tweet from id Software’s official twitter. It seems he’ll be picking up a separate paycheque for his position as Oculus Rift CTO and continue to work at the studio he co-founded back when MS-DOS was King.

Original Story

It seems duct tape and hot glue seduced John Carmack over to the Oculus Rift, where he helped the fledgling prototype finds its feet and starting coding for it.

“I have fond memories of the development work that led to a lot of great things in modern gaming – the intensity of the first person experience, LAN and internet play, game mods, and so on. Duct taping a strap and hot gluing sensors onto Palmer’s early prototype Rift and writing the code to drive it ranks right up there,” said Carmack.

“Now is a special time. I believe that VR will have a huge impact in the coming years, but everyone working today is a pioneer. The paradigms that everyone will take for granted in the future are being figured out today; probably by people reading this message.”

“It’s certainly not there yet. There is a lot more work to do, and there are problems we don’t even know about that will need to be solved, but I am eager to work on them. It’s going to be awesome.”

Oculus Rift is of course ecstatic to have such a pioneer in the games industry join their team. “John is one of the brightest minds of our generation – pioneer, visionary, and industry legend. There are very few people in the world that can contribute to the Oculus Rift and the future of virtual reality like John can,” said his new company.

Carmack has made a big fuss about Oculus Rift even before it became much of a blip on the industry radar. The Doom creator’s biggest dream is to make something like Star Trek’s Holodeck a reality someday, and this is certainly the right path toward that. Currently id Software is currently developing Doom 4.

Bethesda’s response? ”John has long been interested in the work at Oculus VR and wishes to spend time on that project. The technical leadership he provides for games in development at id Software is unaffected.”

Deliver us that Holodeck Mr. Carmack.