John Carmack has finally figured out which side his bread is buttered. After years of struggling to find a foothold in today’s gaming market, the father of the FPS has gotten back to the basics and, in turn, perhaps breathed new life into his once stagnant franchises.

In the early 2000′s, like many other “old-school” developers, Co-Founder of Id, John Carmack, dabbled in modernizing his “classic” titles. Some he directly had a hand in, like Doom III (which kicked ass), while others were handed off to outsourced developers, like Doom III: Resurrection (which blew ass). These facelifts were fun for a while with their mix of nostalgic  references to source material and next-gen graphics but it quickly became tedious. A franchise gets, at most, one good title this way. After that, it just gets old.

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Wolfenstein, another franchise from Carmack and Id, like Doom, had its modern moment in the spotlight. The game was Return to Castle Wolfenstein (RTCW) and it was a hoot. Again, what made it great was that mix of “Wow!” graphics drizzled over game elements and environments of yore. Yes, I said drizzled because it’s a funny word but that doesn’t make my point any less valid. For those familiar with both RTCW and the original Wolfenstein, you know how cool it was to have this soldier cry “Mein Leben!”.

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But then after that first game, each new release was just more of the same. I already saw the Castle Wolfenstein in blazing 3D. I already fought ridiculously unrealistic cyberneticaly enhanced Super-Nazis with rocket launchers for hands, all in the latest 3D engine. After you’ve seen it once, though, sequels are simply more of the same.

So, how does a creative mind like Carmack continue a franchise without selling out? Well, if you’re good at working with simpler tools and extracting greatness from them, you make a little-somethin’ like this…

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This is the most recent in Carmack’s  (and Carmack alone) RPG series he’s created solely for the mobile marketplace. It’s rad. I’ve played through it twice and the only way to describe it is “F’n rad”. Carmack has stated to the press that he now creates only for the iPhone. For someone who has been a Carmack shooter fan for many a moon, I thought I’d hate these games. Quite the contrary.  The first I played was on my old Samsung. It was Doom RPG. After only an hour of play, I realized Carmack was doing the right thing. Keep your franchise but do something new and different with it. I’ve also played through his other series titles as well and they were all equally awesome. Each helped him evolve the concept of the FPS RPG mishmash genre and he’s, again, growing as a developer while at the same time getting new and old gamers to fall in love with his classics all over again.

So a tip of the hat to you, John Carmack. I salute you and your awesomeness. Never let your style get stale and keep on dreaming.