id Software's John Carmack has taken a greater and greater interest in mobile gaming over the last couple years, and the rate at which the hardware iterates in the smartphone and tablet space has allowed the technology to nearly catch up with consoles. In a recent interview with Carmack, IndustryGamers asked whether mobile could become so popular that it'll one day overtake traditional console gaming.

"That’s one of the things that we do discuss internally a lot and it’s amazing to think that when we started Rage, iOS didn’t exist. There was no iPhone. All of that has happened just in the space of one project development timeline. And that’s a little scary when you think about it, because major landscape change could be happening underneath our feet as we work on these large scale projects," noted Carmack. "And we’re going to be doing everything we can to constrain our projects more to not take so long."

He continued, "One thing that we hear a lot, especially from our older developers, is,  'I don’t spend a lot of time sitting down in front of my 360 or PS3, but I pull out my iPad and play some little game all the time.' It’s a different experience though... it’s a diversion rather than a destination. And while they’re certainly powerful enough now to make destination titles, that’s still not really what’s doing particularly well there. But it certainly is a worry. Could the bottom drop out on the triple A market because everyone’s playing Angry Birds? It doesn’t seem to be happening. The numbers don’t show that. We’re selling more big titles than ever before, despite having all of these other platforms out there. So it looks like it’s parallel growth rather than one stealing from the other. But platform wise, you could certainly imagine a future where, instead of having your console, you have your mobile device and it talks to your TV and when you want the experience on your big screen with the surround sound coming out of there, it’s still on the same device."

Ultimately, Carmack does see mobile hardware becoming very powerful very quickly. It's incredible to think that we'll have tiny smartphones more powerful than the PS3 in our pockets at all times, but that day is approaching fast and it could drastically change the industry - that and cloud gaming, says Carmack.

"it’s unquestionable that within a very short time, we’re going to have portable cell phones that are more powerful than the current-gen consoles," he told us. "People have exaggerated the relative powers - the iPad2 is not more powerful than the 360. It’s still a factor of a couple weaker. But the fact that it’s gotten that close that fast - that means that almost certainly, 2 years from now, there will be mobile devices more powerful than what we’re doing all these fabulous games on right now."

He also observed that as technology has advanced, he's been thinking about how best to take advantage in his game design. "I think a lot about the value that we extract from the technical horsepower that we’re given. You make different trades each time. ... I started off developing technology to be like, 'OK, I can out graphics all of this stuff on the same level here.' But I quickly reached the decision, the realization, that rather than trying to make 'pretty damn good plus one' pictures on there, I’d rather try and make pretty damn good pictures at 60 frames per second, and that’s a good example of not pushing graphics as the only thing."

He added, "And convenience is a huge thing. I think that mobile is getting a lot of wins on convenience and I do think that streaming services like OnLive have a future. It’s not at all clear that the existing ones will survive long enough for that future to get there, but I think that it’s almost unquestionable that if you look 5, 10 years in the future, that that type of delivery - even though it’s not going to necessarily be the same graphical quality of latency quality, but a whole lot of convenience can make up for [what's lacking]. So I do wonder if the mobile platforms might get more and more of that going for them, where it provides a good enough experience for [most people] - there’s a whole spectrum of people and there’s a whole spectrum of game concepts and directions. You have the completely casual people that have no interest in buying a PS3. And then you’ve got the hard core people who want to sit down all weekend and stay in a position where they can get 20 hours of gameplay in."

John Carmack: 'Unquestionable' That Mobile Will Surpass Current Consoles
Source: Industry Gamers

Carmack said that the uncompressed build of Rage encompasses a terrabyte of data, and that id will need to use a "different type of compression" to fit the game on two dual-layer Xbox 360 DVDs.

Carmack also noted his belief that neither Doom 4 or Rage will be digitally distributed online, as id isn't looking into that sort of distribution for its major titles at this point.

Videogame pioneer and father of the first person shooter John Carmack is tired of the current backlash that first person shooters have been suffering at the hands of what he calls "snooty" shooter haters, and the implication that somehow first person shooters are synonymous with a lack of creativity.

During an interview with Industry Gamers about id Software's upcoming game, Rage, Carmack described it as a game that is "not just, 'Here's your squadmates.' But that's still a proven formula that people like, and it's a mistake to (discount that). As long as people are buying it, it means they're enjoying it. If they buy the next Call of Duty, it's because they loved the last one and they want more of it."

This opened the door for his disdain for people intimating that shooters lack creativity, "So I am pretty down on people who take the sort of creative auteurs' perspective. It's like 'Oh, we're not being creative.' But we're creating value for people -- that's our job! It's not to do something that nobody's ever seen before. It's to do something that people love so much they're willing to give us money for."

"So I do get pretty down on people that -- you see some of the indie developers that really take a snooty attitude about this," Carmack added, "It's almost as if it's popular, it's not good. And that's just not true."

Part of the current backlash is due to the enormous cash cow that Call of Duty has become, but there has been plenty of evidence that shooters can be creative and artistic, as Ken Levine's upcoming BioShock Infinite proves.

Not that Carmack cares, who states bluntly ,"As long as people are buying it, it means they're enjoying it."

In case you didn't already know, QuakeCon 2011 kicks off on Thursday, August 4 with a keynote from id Software's very own John Carmack. Scroll down for the full list of panels and presentations you can expect at this year's convention.

Welcome and Annual Keynote with John Carmack
Thursday, August 4th at 2:00pm

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Presentation
Friday, August 5th at 1:00pm
Todd Howard, Bethesda Game Studios

20 Years of id Software
Friday, August 5th at 2:30pm
John Carmack, id Software
Tim Willits, id Software
Todd Hollenshead, id Software
Kevin Cloud, id Software

Ultimate Origins: The Games That Influence Us
Friday, August 5th at 4:00pm
Raphael Colantonio, Arkane
Harvey Smith, Arkane
Matt Hooper, id Software
Marcus Smith, Insomniac

Prey 2 Presentation
Friday, August 5th at 5:30pm
Chris Rhinehart, Human Head

Community Managers: Un-moderated!
Saturday, August 6th at 1:00pm
Abbie Heppe, Respawn
Adam Pyle, id Software
Matt Grandstaff, Bethesda Softworks
Nick Breckon, Bethesda Softworks
Ryan Schneider, Insomniac

First-person Perspectives
Saturday, August 6th at 2:30pm
Mackey McClandish, Respawn
Drew Murray, Insomniac
Tim Willits, id Software
Julien Roby, Arkane

PC Perspective Hardware Workshop
Saturday, August 6th at 3:30pm

I like the enemy animations very much, their dying wont be so plain
does this 1 have co-op like bodoland? i think it would be fun for co-op.

Four years ago a little videogame project called Rage was announced by Doom developer id Software, and now it's "basically done" says executive Tim Willits.

They're in a "great place" as it reaches the final stretch of polishing. Put simply it's "different" from Doom, Quake and Wolfenstein - "it really is the best game."


"It's going to be available this fall so we are in the polish and refinement stage which is a great place to be. Now we have all the content done and played through the game and got a real sense for it," revealed creative director Tim Willits.

"I'll be honest with you, it's exciting," he added. "It's different from Doom, Quake and Wolfenstein. It has so much to offer: the vehicle combat, the weapons, the ammo types, the items, the story. It really is the best game."

Some of that polish time will be dedicated to smoothing out the textures for the console versions, but they're confident tech wizard John Carmack can handle it.

The console version is "different to PC in that most of the data is read from the disc; we have the texture page in the texture cache. At times you will see some stuff in the distance loading in... of course, John is working on getting that as final as possible."

Rage releases on Xbox 360, PS3 and PC October 7th. Is it a must have you for?