John Romero, Co-Creator of DOOM

Today, my guest is John Romero, an award-winning game designer, level designer and programmer whose work spans over 130 games, 107 of which have been published commercially, including the iconic works Wolfenstein 3D, DOOM and Quake. John has worked in the mobile, hardcore, mid-core, casual and MMO space.

John has co-founded eight successful game companies including the likes of id Software, Gazillion Entertainment and, most recently, Romero Games which celebrated its 7th anniversary in 2022. John is considered to be among the world’s top game designers, and his games have won well over 100 awards. One of the earliest indie developers, John began working in the game space in 1979 on mainframes before moving to the Apple II in 1982. He is a completely self-taught programmer, designer and artist, having drawn his inspirations from early Apple II programmers. John co-owns Romero Games and is the author of Doom Guy: Life in First Person.