// PC GAMER — GAMING
id Software co-director says the Doom developer is 'working more closely with MachineGames than ever' after Xbox laid off 'about half of our studio'
MachineGames is rumoured to be working on a third Wolfenstein game.
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Id Software has tightened its relationship with fellow shooter specialists MachineGames according to studio co-director Marty Stratton, after Xbox laid off roughly half of the Doom developer's employees earlier this year.
Stratton was asked how the studio was doing following Xbox's massive job cuts at a recent press event for Doom: The Dark Ages' Revelations DLC (via IGN) and he was keen to assure everyone that things are hunky dory at the legendary FPS developer.
"We're doing great," Stratton explained. "Not to handwave the [layoffs] away … everybody knows we had about half of our studio exit as part of that. But there was a very deliberate effort to make sure that we were incredibly viable coming out of that across everything we do, across game development and [the] technology department."
As part of its response to those layoffs, id Software has apparently deepened its ties with MachineGames, developers of Wolfenstein: The New Order and, more recently, the excellent Indiana Jones and the Great Circle.
"We're working more closely with MachineGames than ever," Stratton said. "We've always had a very close partnership with them, but I think we're at the point with technology development that both teams are incredibly talented and have incredibly talented engineers and we're really on an amazing path that had started pre-[layoffs]. We'd kicked this off earlier this year. We're really excited about that. We're both really, really bullish on what we have ahead.
Stratton's comments have led to speculation that the two developers may be cooperating on Wolfenstein 3, which MachineGames is rumoured to be working on. Id Software has just concluded active development of Doom: The Dark Ages following the expansions' release, so this is possible. What's interesting to me, however, is how Stratton repeatedly references technology.
The id Software layoffs heavily impact the developer's Frankfurt arm, including numerous designers of the formidable id-tech engine. This led to fears that id-tech was being shelved. Microsoft contradicted this, though further reports left the question open. But Stratton's comments lead me to believe we might be seeing a tech alignment between the two developers as a result of those Frankfurt layoffs.
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