John Romero’s about make make you his… sorry, force of habit. The Doom co-creator has done more for the image of the “rock star game developer” than almost anybody, and he’s back with Blackroom, a “visceral, action-packed first person shooter set in a holographic simulation gone rogue.”
Blackroom is in development at Romero’s new studio, Night Work Games, and it’ll follow a near-future engineer as he investigates anomalies in his company’s holographic simulator. Because of the ever-changing nature of the Blackroom, players will be able to visit a variety of locales including “military sims, hellish infernos, and interstellar space” in both single-player and co-op campaigns.
Romero launched a Kickstarter campaign and also enlisted fellow id co-founder Adrian Carmack to handle the art design. The developers have already raised $100,000 in pledged funds and they’re seeking a total of only $700,000. After spending millions on the development of Daikatana, Romero has cut way back for Blackroom, but he’s also partnered with an unnamed publisher who will provide addition monetary support if the campaign is fully funded.
Blackroom is still early in development, but Romero already has a vision for how he wants the final game to look and that includes support for online multiplayer, dedicated servers, mods, map creation, and a single-player Challenge Mode. Romero has also promised to spearhead the level design personally and he’s hired guitarist George Lynch to provide a metal-influenced soundtrack.
There is a lot more information about Blackroom’s story and Romero’s plan for the future of the game on the Kickstarter page. And if all goes well, Romero wants to launch Blackroom in Winter 2018 exclusively for the PC. So let’s see if this rock star has one last encore in him.
