John Romero

John Romero is a game designer, programmer, artist and sequential artist whose work spans over 150 games, 100 of which have been published commercially, including the iconic works Wolfenstein 3D, Doom and Quake. His contributions and philanthropy within the commercial game industry have led to many inspired games and the founding of ten companies.

He is best known for his work on 3D level design, game design, game balance, and overall progression for both single-player and multi-player. He was also instrumental in the promoting of cybersports, from LAN parties to DWANGO to the Cyberathlete Professional League. He is considered by many to be the father of deathmatch competitions.

One of the earliest “indie” developers, Romero began working in the game space in 1979 on mainframes before moving to the Apple II in 1981. He is a completely self-taught programmer, designer and artist, having drawn his inspirations from early Apple II programmers, including the likes of Nasir Gebelli, Richard Garriott, Bill Budge and Tony Suzuki.

Romero is currently working on games at his game company, Romero Games Ltd., based in Galway, Ireland. He was previously co-founder of Loot Drop, founded in November 2010 and ended in 2015. Romero also remains active in the artgame, game history and indie spaces.

Romero also founded Capitol Ideas Software and co-founded Inside Out Software, Ideas From The Deep, id Software, Ion Storm, Monkeystone Games, Gazillion Entertainment, and Loot Drop.