History Creator / JohnRomero

* LighterAndSofter: ''ComicBook/CartoonNetworkBlockParty'' and ''VideoGame/RavenwoodFair''.

* LighterAndSofter: ''Cartoon Network Block Party'' and ''VideoGame/RavenwoodFair''.

* ThePeterPrinciple: Romero's admittedly high skill as a programmer and designer did not translate to any skill whatsoever as a project leader, manager or administrator. Painfully evident throughout the ''VideoGame/{{Daikatana}}'' debacle, as the game launched several years late, several million dollars over-budget, and with several design decisions that hampered gameplay because he didn't have anyone to rein in his weirder ideas like at id Software.

He's gone on record saying his all-time favourite video game is ''VideoGame/ChronoTrigger'' and he likes heavy metal music. He is also a very well-known [=MacHead=][[note]]Somewhat ironically, this means he's unfamiliar with modern developments the shooter genre that made him famous because few have been released on Mac and he refuses to play shooters on consoles.[[/note]] and only got his first Windows computer late in the New Tens. For more information about Romero's history and influence on video game culture, read all about it in David Kushner's ''Masters Of Doom''. If you have any questions you want to ask him about his games (even ''Daikatana''), there's a good chance he'll answer them on [[https://twitter.com/romero his Twitter]].

* CreatorCouple: During the ''Daikatana'' era, John Romero and Stevie "Killcreek" Case. John Romero is currently married to Brenda Romero (nee Braithwaite), a prolific game designer in her own right (having worked on, among other things, the ''Wizardry'' series).

* ThePeterPrinciple: Romero's admittedly high skill as a programmer and designer did not translate to any skill whatsoever as a project leader, manager or administrator. Painfully evident throughout the ''VideoGame/{{Daikatana}}'' debacle.

* DoingItForTheArt: During a [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Csa2dkKFle0 rather awkward 2019 interview]][[note]]Yahtzee had used Romero as a target of mockery many times in [[WebAnimation/ZeroPunctuation his famous game review series]].[[/note]] Romero conducted with [[Creator/BenCroshaw Benjamin "Yahtzee" Croshaw]] about his upcoming game, ''VideoGame/EmpireOfSin,'' Romero explained why he's still working in the games industry after so many decades: because he loves every aspect of making games, from level design to coding to audio.
-->'''Yahtzee:''' What is it that makes you keep coming back to creating games, when you- like, I'm guessing you don't really need to financially or anything, right?
-->'''Romero:''' [[ItsWhatIDo 'cause I have to. I have to make games.]]

Alfonso John Romero (born October 28, 1967) is an American video game developer born in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

!! Tropes include:

* NiceGuy: By most accounts, at least post ''Daikatana''.

* ThePeterPrinciple: Romero's admittedly high skill as a programmer and designer did not translate to any skill whatsoever as a project leader, manager or administrator. Painfully evident throughout the ''VideoGame/{{Daikatana}}'' debacle.

In 1996, following some long-running disputes with the other members of id Software, he, co-worker Tom Hall, along with Todd Porter and Jerry O'Flaherty, formed Creator/IonStorm. Ion Storm's flagship title would have been ''VideoGame/{{Daikatana}}'', an ambitious first-person shooter set for the holiday season of 1997, a [[DevelopmentHell seven-month development period]] that his former partners at iD, notably Carmack, saw as patently ludicrous.[[note]]It's worth mentioning, though, that short development times were nothing that unusual during the dawn of first person shooters - iD themselves, with Romero still on board, developed ''Wolfenstein 3D'' in a few months and the first two ''Doom'' releases took about half a year each to complete. ''Quake'' was iD's first project that had a development time of over a year (at least according to ''Masters of Doom'', the iD biography).[[/note]] When he decided to switch to the ''VideoGame/{{Quake}} II'' engine in the middle of development for its advanced graphical effects, company morale had eroded by then, with most of the team either quitting outright, or moving to the studio's Austin branch, spearheaded by Warren Spector of Looking Glass fame. John set another deadline, February 15, 1999, but the game still was not finished by then. It wasn't until April 21, 2000 that ''Daikatana'' was finally released.

After programming and designing video games for over eight years (and writing 21 year old Jordan Mechner a [[http://jordanmechner.com/blog/2012/03/romero-karateka/ fan letter]] about ''VideoGame/{{Karateka}}''), Romero left Softdisk after two years to form Creator/IdSoftware in 1991. At id, Romero was involved in the production of ''VideoGame/CommanderKeen'', ''VideoGame/Wolfenstein3D'', the first two ''VideoGame/{{Doom}}'' games, and ''VideoGame/{{Quake}}''. (The [[http://www.javno.com/en/foto.php?id=22&rbr=7720&idrf=371414 hot]] GamerChick Stevie "killcreek" Case defeated him at Quake and [[DefeatMeansFriendship became his girlfriend]].)

He's gone on record saying his all-time favourite video game is ''VideoGame/ChronoTrigger'' and he likes heavy metal music. He is also a very well-known [=MacHead=][[note]]Somewhat ironically, this means he's unfamiliar with modern developments the shooter genre that made him famous because few have been released on Mac and he refuses to play shooters on consoles.[[/note]] and only got his first Windows computer late in the New Tens. For more information about Romero's history and influence on video game culture, read all about it in David Kushner's ''Masters Of Doom''. If you have any questions you want to ask him about his games (even ''Daikatana''), there's a good chance he'll answer them on [https://twitter.com/romero Twitter]].

He's gone on record saying his all-time favourite video game is ''VideoGame/ChronoTrigger'' and he likes heavy metal music. He is also a very well-known [=MacHead=][[note]]Somewhat ironically, this means he's unfamiliar with modern developments the shooter genre that made him famous because few have been released on Mac and he refuses to play shooters on consoles.[[/note]] and only got his first Windows computer late in the New Tens. For more information about Romero's history and influence on video game culture, read all about it in David Kushner's ''Masters Of Doom''. If you have any questions you want to ask him about his games (even ''Daikatana''), there's a good chance he'll answer them on [[www.twitter.com/romero his Twitter]].

He's gone on record saying his all-time favourite video game is ''VideoGame/ChronoTrigger'' and he likes heavy metal music. He is also a very well-known [=MacHead=][[note]]Somewhat ironically, this means he's unfamiliar with modern developments the shooter genre that made him famous because few have been released on Mac and he refuses to play shooters on consoles.[[/note]] and only got his first Windows computer late in the New Tens. For more information about Romero's history and influence on video game culture, read all about it in David Kushner's ''Masters Of Doom''.

He and his wife, Brenda, [[BadassTeacher helped to train game designers]] at the University of California, Santa Cruz. They later founded a studio, Romero Games, in 2015. The first game was a remaster of ''Dangerous Dave in the Deserted Pirate's Hideout'', followed by ''Gunman Taco Truck''. In 2019, Romero released a megawad called ''VideoGame/{{Sigil}}'', which serves as the unofficial fifth episode for the original ''Doom''. In E3 2019, Romero Games revealed ''VideoGame/Empire of Sin'', a mafia strategy game published by Creator/ParadoxInteractive.

He and his wife, Brenda, [[BadassTeacher helped to train game designers]] at the University of California, Santa Cruz. They later founded a studio, Romero Games, in 2015. The first game was a remaster of ''Dangerous Dave in the Deserted Pirate's Hideout'', followed by ''Gunman Taco Truck''. In 2019, Romero released a megawad called ''VideoGame/{{Sigil}}'', which serves as the unofficial fifth episode for the original ''Doom''. In E3 2019, Romero Games revealed ''Empire of Sin'', a mafia strategy game published by Creator/ParadoxInteractive.

In 1996, after some long-running disputes with the other members of id Software, he and co-worker Tom Hall formed Creator/IonStorm. Ion Storm's flagship title would have been ''VideoGame/{{Daikatana}}'', an ambitious first-person shooter set for the holiday season of 1997, a [[DevelopmentHell seven-month development period]] that his former partners at id saw as patently ludicrous.[[note]]It's worth mentioning, though, that short development times were nothing that unusual during the dawn of first person shooters - id themselves, with Romero still on board, developed ''Wolfenstein 3D'' in a few months and the first two ''Doom'' releases took about half a year each to complete. ''Quake'' was id's first project that had a development time of over a year (at least according to ''Masters of Doom'', the id biography).[[/note]] When he decided to switch to the ''VideoGame/{{Quake}} II'' engine in the middle of development for its advanced graphical effects, company morale had eroded and most of the team had quit. John set another deadline, February 15, 1999, but the game still was not finished by then. It wasn't until April 21, 2000 that ''Daikatana'' was finally released.

He and his wife, Brenda, [[BadassTeacher helped to train game designers]] at the University of California, Santa Cruz. They later founded a studio, Romero Games, in 2015. The first game was a remaster of ''Dangerous Dave in the Deserted Pirate's Hideout'', followed by ''Gunman Taco Truck''. In 2019, Romero released a megawad called ''VideoGame/{{Sigil}}'', which serves as the unnoficial fifth episode for the original ''Doom''. In E3 2019, Romero Games revealed ''Empire of Sin'', a mafia strategy game published by Creator/ParadoxInteractive.

He's said his favourite video game is ''VideoGame/ChronoTrigger'' and he likes heavy metal music. He is also a very well-known [=MacHead=][[note]]Somewhat ironically, this means he's unfamiliar with modern developments the shooter genre that made him famous because few have been released on Mac and he refuses to play shooters on consoles.[[/note]] and only got his first Windows computer late in the New Tens. For more information about Romero's history and influence on video game culture, read the whole story in David Kushner's ''Masters Of Doom''.