John Carmack Quotes & Sayings

“Focused, hard work is the real key to success. Keep your eyes on the goal, and just keep taking the next step towards completing it. If you aren't sure which way to do something, do it both ways and see which works better.”

“Programming is not a zero-sum game. Teaching something to a fellow programmer doesn't take it away from you. I'm happy to share what I can, because I'm in it for the love of programming.”

“Focus is a matter of deciding what things you're not going to do.”

“Rocket science has been mythologized all out of proportion to its true difficulty.”

“The speed of light sucks.”

“The cost of adding a feature isn't just the time it takes to code it. The cost also includes the addition of an obstacle to future expansion. The trick is to pick the features that don't fight each other.”

“Low-level programming is good for the programmer's soul.”

“The Xbox 360 is the first console that I've ever worked with that actually has development tools that are better for games than what we've had on PC.”

“At its best, entertainment is going to be a subjective thing that can't win for everyone, while at worst, a particular game just becomes a random symbol for petty tribal behavior.”

“I have fond memories of the development work that led to a lot of great things in modern gaming - the intensity of the first person experience, LAN and Internet play, game mods, and so on.”