''Blackroom'' was an upcoming FPS title from the independent studio Night Work Games, created by former

id Software id Software LLC () is an American video game developer based in Richardson, Texas. It was founded on February 1, 1991, by four members of the computer company Softdisk: programmers John Carmack and John Romero, game designer Tom Hall, and ar ...

developers

John Romero John is a common English name and surname: * John (given name) * John (surname) John may also refer to: New Testament Works * Gospel of John, a title often shortened to John * First Epistle of John, often shortened to 1 John * Second ...

and

Adrian Carmack Adrian Carmack (born May 5, 1969) is an American video game artist and one of four co-founders of id Software, along with Tom Hall, John Romero, and John Carmack (no relation). The founders met while working at Softdisks ''Gamer's Edge'' division ...

. The game was planned to be crowdfunded on the

Kickstarter Kickstarter is an American public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative projects to life". As of July 2021, ...

platform, but the crowdfunding campaign was cancelled in April 2016. The game was set to launch during the winter quarter of 2018. However, as of April 2022, there have been no more updates about the game's development.

Gameplay

The game was set to be a

first-person shooter First-person shooter (FPS) is a sub-genre of shooter video games centered on gun and other weapon-based combat in a first-person perspective, with the player experiencing the action through the eyes of the protagonist and controlling the pl ...

in the same vein as classic shooters that Romero and Carmack first formulated in their early game development years. It was described as "a return to fast, violent and masterful play on the PC." The game was also to feature various multiplayer modes along with its single player campaign, including co-operative play, deathmatch, and more. The controls were described as "fast, skillful movement with rocket jumping, strafe jumping and circle strafing," similar to the controls featured in a previous id Software title, '' Quake''.

Plot

The game takes place in an alternate world. HOXAR, a company that specializes in virtual and alternate reality technology, has created the ''HoloSims'', a device that simulates another world to its

user Ancient Egyptian roles * User (ancient Egyptian official), an ancient Egyptian nomarch (governor) of the Eighth Dynasty * Useramen, an ancient Egyptian vizier also called "User" Other uses * User (computing), a person (or software) using an ...

. However, something has gone awry with the system, and its users are beginning to see their simulations being warped and changed with terrifying results. The player plays as Dr. Santiago Sonora, a Chief Engineer at HOXAR. After an encounter with the HoloSims device, Sonora begins to have a difficult time separating simulation from reality. Armed with the HOXAR device Boxel and their wits, it is up to Sonora to defeat the system.

Development

Romero's first intention to create a new

goes back to 2012, when he mentioned the idea on Twitter. Going forward, during 2014, Romero again certified he was creating a new FPS, and said "I haven't made a shooter since 2000 ''

Daikatana ''Daikatana'' is a 2000 first-person shooter game developed by Ion Storm. It was published by Eidos Interactive for Microsoft Windows and Kemco for Nintendo 64. Players control a swordsmaster who travels through various time periods in an eff ...

''. So I'm basically starting to work on another one". In January 2016, few months before Kickstarter campaign, John Romero said about the game "I don't want to talk about it, because it's a really cool idea, an original idea. I've never seen anything like that before". Romero announced the game's title as ''Blackroom'', on April 25, 2016, and started a

crowdfunding Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising money from a large number of people, typically via the internet. Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing and alternative finance. In 2015, over was raised worldwide by crow ...

campaign with an aim of $700,000 to be reached in 32 days. The project features

lead designer Game design is the art of applying design and aesthetics to create a game for entertainment or for educational, exercise, or experimental purposes. Increasingly, elements and principles of game design are also applied to other interactions, in ...

and

programmer A computer programmer, sometimes referred to as a software developer, a software engineer, a programmer or a coder, is a person who creates computer programs — often for larger computer software. A programmer is someone who writes/creates ...

artist An artist is a person engaged in an activity related to creating art, practicing the arts, or demonstrating an art. The common usage in both everyday speech and academic discourse refers to a practitioner in the visual arts only. However, th ...

and

Dokken Dokken is an American glam metal band formed in Los Angeles in 1978. It split up in 1989 and reformed four years later. The band had several hit singles which charted on the Billboard Hot 100, such as " Alone Again", " In My Dreams", and " Burn ...

's George Lynch as composer; about ''Blackroom'', Romero said "We're developing exactly the type of game we think a lot of shooter fans want. It's the type of shooter we're known for, and the type of game we love to play ourselves. It's a skillful shooter, from movement to weapon and map mastery". On April 29, 2016, John Romero cancelled ''Blackroom''s Kickstarter campaign, which stopped at over $131,000, pausing it to develop a ''Blackroom'' demo and planning to show that and reopen the campaign in the future. In an interview on November 23, 2019, Romero claimed he was still working on ''Blackroom''. As of September 2020, there has been no new public release.

References

External links

*{{Official website, https://web.archive.org/web/20190401072648/http://www.blackroomgame.com/ (archived)
Developer website
(archived) 2018 video games Cancelled macOS games Cancelled Windows games First-person shooters First-person shooter multiplayer online games Kickstarter-funded video games Video games developed in Ireland Science fantasy video games Unreal Engine games Windows games MacOS games