John Romero will publish a memoir next year

john romero noclip — (Image credit: Noclip on YouTube)

Id Software co-founder John Romero has an autobiography coming out in January. It's called Doom Guy: Life in First Person, and according to the official blurb, it'll cover everything from Romero's youth, the creation of id Software and its formative games, as well as his "high-profile falling out with his id Software co-founder John Carmack".

In other words, Doom Guy will run the whole gamut of Romero's life, and while he described it on Twitter as "a positive story of gratitude for a life in games", it sounds like it will touch on some more confronting aspects of the developer's life.

"His story is truly one of a self-made man, founding multiple companies after a childhood filled with violence and abuse drove him to video game design, where he could create new worlds and places to escape to," reads the publisher's description. "An alcoholic father, a racist grandfather who did not approve of Romero’s parents’ mixed-race coupling, and a grandmother who once ran a brothel in Mexico combine for an illuminating story of his youth—a story that has never before been revealed."

Details of Romero's personal life will no doubt prove interesting, but so will the details on Romero's 1996 departure from id Software. The acrimonious departure was described in detail in David Kushner's Masters of Doom, but we'll presumably get some more detail from Romero's perspective in his own book. Masters of Doom, by the way, was getting a TV adaptation as of 2019, but no details have been released since.

Doom Guy is published by Abrams Books and will release on January 10 in both hardcover and ebook editions. Here's the cover:

Doom Guy: Life in First Person — (Image credit: Abrams Books)

John Romero is currently working on Sigil 2, a megawad for Doom 2. He released a level from the project in February, which ended up raising over $29,000 for humanitarian aid in Ukraine.

Shaun Prescott is the Australian editor of PC Gamer. With over ten years experience covering the games industry, his work has appeared on GamesRadar+, TechRadar, The Guardian, PLAY Magazine, the Sydney Morning Herald, and more. Specific interests include indie games, obscure Metroidvanias, speedrunning, experimental games and FPSs. He thinks Lulu by Metallica and Lou Reed is an all-time classic that will receive its due critical reappraisal one day.