EA Teams With Carmack, Fountainhead On Orcs & Elves

Major publisher Electronic Arts has announced the development of Orcs & Elves, a brand new first-person, turn-based fantasy RPG, created exclusively for mobile phones by Doom and Quake creator id Software and Fountainhead Entertainment. The game continues John Carmack's cellphone game interest, piqued by the completion of Doom RPG for publishing by the now EA-acquired Jamdat. Orcs & Elves, utilizes the next generation Doom RPG graphics engine, and provides a hybrid gameplay experience, combining first-person action and tactical turn-based RPG. The game will be available exclusively to Verizon Wireless customers in North America on May 9, 2006, and nationwide in July. As for the game's plot, according to the firms: "With the help of a magical talking wand, players explore an ancient Dwarven fortress riddled with legendary beasts and untold treasures." “The formative computer games of my youth were fantasy games, so I am happy to finally bring one to market,” said John Carmack, founder and technical director, id Software. “Orcs & Elves has been explicitly designed to play to the strengths and avoid the weaknesses of the mobile platform, with easy game play, a tight design, and a rewarding presentation of a world we think players will want to see more of.” Gamasutra conducted an interview with id's John Carmack regarding Orcs & Elves, and his thoughts on why mobile gaming is of such recent interest to him, and will be publishing it later today.