Masters of Doom: How Two Guys Created an Empire and Transformed Pop Culture
by David Kushner

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Book Reviews of Masters of Doom: How Two Guys Created an Empire and Transformed Pop Culture

Book Review: A Classic Business Parable
Summary: 5 Stars

Their many fans call them "The Two Johns," John Carmack and John Romero. They were both products of broken homes, and of the years when video games were enjoyed in arcades only. Both of them were better at playing video games and writing programs than they were at making grades or making friends. They came up with real innovations, now taken for granted, like side scrolling for the PC or rooms with skewed walls. All were steps to make the games look better, of course, but the overall effect was to make them more involving, increasing the illusion that "You are not just playing the game, you're inhabiting it." They also increased the blood; monsters or bad guys that were killed did not simply vanish when brought into the sights and fired upon. These were not the only innovations; Doom, released in 1993, featured the "Deathmatch" in which players could play together or against each other. There might be mutants afoot, generated by the game, but players could also plot with or against each other, and blow each other away. Doom (and their follow-up, Quake) proved to be so addictive and involving that players would be glued to their computers, even if they were suffering motion sickness induced by the realistic visions on the screen.

The book's concentration on the tale of the two gamers, Carmack the programmer and Romero the designer, will make it a pleasure to read even for those who know nothing about computers. The eventual split between them, fuelled by millions of dollars, is, of course, a classic business parable. Their company changed computer games, and in some ways, the computer industry, forever. _Masters of Doom_ is an impressive documentation of how games got to be the way they are now, as well as a social history of the lives and times of two key game makers. Kushner wisely does not go into deep sociological examination of the effects of the games' violence, but of course the two Johns weren't interested in any moral implications of their wares. "Doom was cowboys and Indians with better special effects," Kushner explains, and though this might be too light an analysis, it is much more fitting than blaming Doom for Columbine. The games may be suitable subjects for moral disdain, but that will make no difference to those who get a rush from spending time in this way, and more importantly, it will make no difference in the millions of dollars spent on games that will probably get more and more like being in a movie, and thus will continue to push computing limits. Carmack and Romero have forever changed people's ability to live out dreams of escape and power, and have changed people's ideas of what computers can do.

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