Overview
- Earlier this week a Texas WARN filing and reporting by multiple outlets showed id Software cut about 136 roles, leaving roughly 49 staff on payroll.
- Co‑founders John Carmack and John Romero publicly reacted with sorrow and concern, with Carmack saying his prior faith in Microsoft’s stewardship “isn’t aging well” while urging hope the studio can recover.
- Xbox issued a rebuttal to extreme staffing claims, telling reporters that “dozens” of people still work on the id Tech engine across multiple locations and that reports of a single remaining engineer in Texas are inaccurate.
- Former staff and a Kotaku source warned the cuts damaged institutional knowledge and left key id Tech contributors gone, a claim that Microsoft’s statement does not fully resolve and that leaves the engine’s long‑term health disputed.
- The reductions come as part of Xbox CEO Asha Sharma’s wider reset and leave several in‑flight pitches and future projects — including reported ideas for a Perfect Dark reboot and co‑op Doom — in unclear status while the industry watches whether id will act as an independent lead studio or shift to smaller support roles.