John Carmack may have been Oculus’ most high-profile poaching from id, but he was only the first. Rage design director Matt Hooper followed within a week, and now Doom and Quake alumnus Kenneth Scott has joined the studio as art director.
Scott most recently worked at 343 Industries, where he served as art director on Halo 4 for three years. He’ll occupy the same role in Oculus’ first-party content team.
Welcome Kenneth Scott (@superactionfunb), Oculus Art Director, formerly of 343 and id Software. Ken is building our 1st-party content team!
— Oculus (@oculus) May 13, 2014
Scott’s career spans back to Quake III in 1997. In the time since, he’s worked on Quake III Arena, Doom 3, Quake 4 and Enemy Territory: Quake Wars. His resume could not be Quakier.
What Scott has in common with Hooper is a break from id prior to his hiring at Oculus. Oculus may not have any time for Zenimax’s IP claims, but they seem to have courtesy enough not to take any more staff directly from the Doom lot.
So why do Oculus need a dev team? While Half-Life 2 and Skyrim are halfway compatible with the Rift, there’s a slower-paced, vista-heavy sweet spot where the Rift starts to make most sense. Perhaps that’s the sort of game Hooper and co are building?
Thanks, GameIndustry.