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id Releases Open Source Wolfenstein 3D for the iPhone
An anonymous reader writes "id Software has released a port of the classic Wolfenstein FPS to the iPhone. Some of the coding was done by John Carmack himself, who also used original code combined with new code from Wolf3D Redux. The original code was open sourced years ago, and enthusiasts have been updating it, which made the port considerably easier for id. It's available in the iTunes App Store, but the source is available for free at id's website."
Carmack also posted a detailed writeup about the decision to bring Wolf3D to the iPhone, including design notes and a few snippets of code. At the end, he says, "I'm going back to Rage for a while, but I do expect Classic Doom to come fairly soon for the iPhone." Kotaku got a chance to try the game at GDC: "It's not just a good reproduction of the original, it seems better."
Doom already runs on Rockbox. If the iPhone were an open platform, this would have happened a long time ago.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
What really gets me is how Ultima Underworld never gets the credit it deserves. It shipped before Wolfenstein 3D, and was a better game to boot.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultima_Underworld
You could look up and down, you could jump, swim, examine objects, interact with objects, there were RPG stats, etc. Gameplay was non-linear, and there was even an honest-to-goodness story. Lighting was dynamic, and there was even auto-map.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_Spector
Spector never gets the respect he is due either.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
I thought the same thing. If he's still a developer, he really missed a huge opportunity. On the other hand, he can still say that some of his work was used in a commercial game for the iPhone, selected by Carmack himself, which is a pretty cool thing to be able to put on your resume.