id Software Forms New Mobile Division

id Software is responsible for some of the all-time classic videogames; Doom, Wolfenstein – that was id and co-founder John Carmack’s doing. The company today announced that it will be forming a mobile division which will focus on developing games for lower-end platforms and, more specifically, mobile phones and the Nintendo DS.

“Obviously right now phones make really poor gaming systems,” Carmack told Wired. “But there’s no techncial reason why, in the coming years, phones don’t become as good gaming machines as something like the Nintendo DS.”

The studio will be made up of the five employees from Carmack’s wife’s studio, Fountainhead, which will in turn be closed. Fountainhead developed id’s Orcs & Elves for DS.

The company will aim to internally develop two games per year, with another two “non-traditional id projects” during the same period. One example of the latter would be a Wii version of Orcs & Elves.

Game|Life has the full transcript of Carmack’s chat with Wired. Read it here.