Doom Creator John Romero Revives Xbox-Canceled Game At New Publisher
Romero Games' next shooter has found a new publisher, although the scope of the project has drastically changed since Xbox dropped it
The upcoming game from Doom creator John Romero faced cancellation by Xbox last year. However, Romero confirmed in a recent interview that his studio, Romero Games, secured a new publisher for the project. John Romero and his wife, Brenda Romero, co-founded Romero Games over a decade ago and have previously worked on games like Gunman Taco Truck, Empire of Sin, and Doom + Doom II episodes.
The studio aimed to develop a AAA shooter in partnership with Xbox Game Studios, but the project was eliminated during Xbox's 2025 layoffs. As a result, Romero Games had to let go of additional developers. In a recent interview with Video Games Chronicle, John Romero revealed that Romero Games had scaled down from 110 developers to just 5 due to insufficient funding.
Despite this setback, they retained ownership of all intellectual property related to the canceled project. Romero explained that he reached out to a familiar contact and secured a new publisher for the game. As of October 2026, Romero Games employs around 15 developers. The game has been restructured, resulting in a complete redesign of a distinct game that incorporates elements from previous works.
Romero highlighted that the game benefits from existing art, code assets, and common programming used in shooters, providing a significant head-start. Regardless of the final game's form, it's encouraging to see that some components of the original project will still see release. Regrettably, other studios impacted by layoffs have not been as fortunate.
Written by urgent.news from Polygon's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
