Carmack Rips Apple Over Gaming Support

Lead iD Software programmer and game guru John Carmack doesn't believe Apple is making an effort when it comes to gaming.

Apple has displeased the gaming gods. Although esteemed developer John Carmack has, in the past, said he owns Macs, and even appeared at this year’s Worldwide Developer Conference to show off a new game engine that would run on Macs, he has reservations about the future of gaming on Apple devices. In a recent interview with GameDaily, Carmack criticized Apple for its approach to gaming, even admitting he had a “heated argument” with Steve Jobs at the WWDC.

“Steve Jobs and I have not been seeing really eye to eye on a lot of important issues,” he said in the interview. “I have an iPhone right now, and it’s a platform I would enjoy developing for, but Apple is not taking progressive steps in regards to [gaming].”

Carmack’s concern stems from the poor support the iPod received as a gaming platform, which he fears may be repeated with the iPhone. “When they finally allowed games to be put on the iPod… in many ways it’s one of the worst environments to develop games for,” Carmack said. “I expressed my fears directly to Steve Jobs that some of these mistakes might be carried over to the iPhone, so they’re at least aware of all of them, but they’re not giving any spectacular signs that it’s going to be a big deal for them in the next year.”

While Carmack made it clear that he disagrees with Apple’s approach, he went out of his way to point out that, financially, it hasn’t hindered the company at all. None of Carmack’s comments indicated that iD had any plans not to develop Rage (the game engine showcased at the WWDC) for Macs as previously planned.