Hacker News Reader

Comment by Nican | Hacker News Reader

I recommend the book too. It is a great story on how passion drove the development of such great games.

I was sad when I read the book. I remember reading about how Carmack and Romero drifted apart. Though the consensus seems to be that it was better for id that Romero left, I believe that their games could have been so much more creative had things turned out otherwise.

Some of the greatest archievments are accomplished with people forced to work together who ditest one another. The creative Chaos needed to tell great stories, to leap beyond the barriers of imagination so far ruffles the feathers of those determined to keep everything efficient and on track, those responsible for planning and executing the techno-magic.

The creatives meanwhile rebell against the final say they never will have in such a project, to avoid it beeing burried by daydreams.

This is what a good manager actually does- keeping a volatile mixture of people detached just enough to avoid a catastrophe - and close enough to harness all the beneficial reactions. Like a force field contained fission reactor on leg.

Well said. It was a little sad to read that there is such a feud between them in the later years knowing that these games shaped some of our lives. Before reading this book I had no prior knowledge of what happened at the company during those days. It's also interesting to see what each person ended up doing later in their career.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com