“It’s in my DNA, it’s in my blood. If you cut me, I’ll bleed Qs.”
If anyone deserves to have Qs running through their veins, it’s Tim Willits. After uploading demise maps to early BBS systems in the mid-’90s, id Software hired Willits to help design maps for a new fully 3D shooter called quake. Since then, Willits has risen to Studio Director at id, working on every game in the quake series and attending every QuakeCon meeting since 1996.
With the upcoming release of Quake champions, we spoke to Willits at this year’s E3 about his storied history with the company. Watch our video chat above to hear how the FPS level design was supposed to change in the post-quake era, what core elements make a quake game feels “true”, and why Willits feels quake is actually id’s most influential game.