The king returns!
John Romero, one of the main minds behind genre-defining games like Doom, Wolfenstein, and Quake has decided to go back to his roots.
John has announced on Twitter that his studio is expanding. Romero Games, which is co-owned by John and his wife Brenda, was founded in 2015 but hadn’t dabbled in the FPS genre until now.
The studio’s first original release was Gunman Taco Truck, a small crazy indie game that didn’t have too much of an impact. More recently, Romero Games developed Empire of Sin, a game with a much higher budget, that faced a lot of criticism in its reception.
Now, though, the hype is back. John Romero, a name synonymous with the FPS genre working on a new title right at the peak of the retro-fps boom.
The next era
New Blood Interactive made an entire studio out of making “boomer-shooters.” Doom has experienced a resurgence through DOOM 2016 and Eternal. Metal Hellsinger, a sort of rhythm-Doom shooter releases in September.
What can a legendary FPS veteran bring to this blooming age of FPS with the kind of technology that Unreal Engine 5 will bring?
Romero Games seems to be avoiding overhyping this upcoming title, but the very high expectations are impossible to avoid when John’s name is on the table.
The studio also avoided touching on the Publisher subject, giving away only that it is a “Major Publisher.” It’s safe to admit that Microsoft/Bethesda are not interested in funding a direct competitor to their Doom and Wolfenstein IPs, so who could be working with Romero on this?
Electronic Arts have been betting a lot on smaller studios (with great success so far) so it’s a possibility. The more intriguing one, though, is Sony.
They’ve shown interest in shooters with Returnal and the Dualsense’s Adaptive Triggers could be used to a great length in an FPS with a lot of gun variety.
It’s all speculation, for now. The sky’s the limit for Romero Games, let’s see what they can bring to FPS fans in the next few years.
