Gamers across the globe have always looked to id Software since the days of Wolfenstein and Doom as the pioneers of the deathmatch. With virtually every shooter released since those glory days in the early 1990's having some sort of "kill everyone you see" multiplayer mode, it came as quite a surprise that id's newest release, RAGE, was lacking the staple of first-person shooters. In an interview with Kotaku, id's Tim Willits sheds some light on the decision.
Willits makes the argument that id always "wanted to do something different with Rage" and that they "didn't want Rage to follow the same pattern of our other titles; we wanted it to be unique amongst our IPs." As those of you familiar with the game know, RAGE features a multiplayer mode involving the vehicular portion of the game, not its FPS counterpart. Willits also said, "The easy path would have been to create a classic deathmatch game but if no one takes risks anymore the entire industry will begin to get stagnate. I think gamers are quite shrewd these days and appreciate developers trying to explore new game types that aren't done in every other title they release."
While I admire id's desire to do something new, couldn't they have included a deathmatch mode in addition to the vehicle mode? Maybe it wasn't in the budget, but that would have satisfied both those looking for classic multiplayer and those looking for something new.
