Carmack's foray into the world of cell phone gaming can be partially attributed to his wife, who noticed men standing around the mall playing games on their phones as their wives shopped or tried on clothes.

She started approaching them and asking if the games were any fun. The answer, almost universally, was "No, but it's a good way to kill time."

A role-playing adaptation of "Doom" was Carmack's first stab at cell phone games. Now he's created "Orcs and Elves," which is the first new intellectual property from id Software since "Quake" was released in 1996.

Carmack has been talking about the potential in cell phone gaming for some time now. In his keynote delivered at Game Developers Conference 2004, he pointed out the viability of the platform as a place to generate new IP without the enormous investment, and therefore risk, required to generate a new property on PC or consoles. He likened cell phone development to early PC development, in which very small teams could create a polished product on a shoestring budget. In that vein, he now describes spending two days holed up in a hotel room finishing Orcs & Elves. "My sneaky little plan is we might be able to graduate a franchise from cell phones to one of the big platforms," he said, though he didn't give any indication as to whether this particular game is in line to move on up.

He notes that due to positive reception, the game will probably see a sequel. Visually, it actually looks a bit like Doom, putting a more cartoonish slant on the classic shooter's iconic pseudo-3D look and muddy color design (screenshots here). In the past, Carmack has commented on the unsuitability of cell phone control schemes to action games, which would explain why the traditionally FPS-focused developer has made two RPGs in a row. In fact, he wants to take that even further, with a cell phone MMO. "I have absolutely no interest in going and competing with Blizzard in the high end of that market, he notes, "but a cell phone version might be interesting."