Looking Glass

Looking Glass was the creator of many great PC games.

-Ultima Underworld
-Ultima Underworld 2
-System Shock
-Flight Unlimited
-Terra Nova
-British Open Championship Golf
-Flight Unlimited 2
-Flight Unlimited 3
-Thief
-System Shock 2
-Thief 2

I believe they also worked on a Road & Track racing game in the early 90's (not Need For Speed).

The games listed above were, for me and a lot of other people, some of the greatest games ever made. Ultima Underworld was out around the time of Wolfenstein, but you could jump in UU. System Shock was out around the time of Doom, and along with being an ammazingly massively immersive RPG, it also included sloped surfaces, something which Doom did not.

Looking Glass is the code name for an emergency airborne command post maintained by SAC (and after its demise, STRATCOM) as part of the U.S. C3I system in case of nuclear war. For twenty-five-plus years, there was always a command aircraft in flight over the U.S. or Pacific carrying a general officer from SAC and an operations staff. In the event of nuclear decapitation, this general (also referred to as Looking Glass) would assume command of U.S. nuclear forces. Elaborate systems of command and control existed (and still do, in many cases) to ensure that communications between Looking Glass (or other parts of the NCA) and the nuclear forces would remain open. Looking Glass still exists, but is no longer on 24-hour airborne alert; in the event of rising tensions or crisis, the aircraft would begin flying again.

Pr0n K1ng seems to have noded the good part of Looking Glass' history so I'm going to continue with the bad part.

The bad part is the Looking Glass is no more. It was shutdown just after Thief 2 was ready. This is a tremendous loss for all gaming. The big question is WHY? Looking Glass was making great "artistic" games and the games even sold pretty well at the same time their producer, Eidos, funded John Romero and Co. with Daikatana which is mostly considered as a bad, normal first-person shooter. So it goes.

The theory that I belive, is that Looking Glass was shutdown because Eidos had lost a lot of money with Daikatana and knew that the money was not coming back. So they had to choose from Looking Glass or John Romero. And because John Romero is John Romero he had to stay. So they fired Looking Glass. This is how great decision are made.

The odd part is that Eidos that quarter's revenues were mostly generated by Thief 2, not by Daikatana. John Romero didn't make you his bitch... Thank God for that atleast.

Well I guess this is more of the good part - Now most of the people of Looking Glass are working with Ion Storm and busy making Thief 3. So I guess this story has an ending, but is the ending good or what? I guess we'll see when Thief 3 is out and installed on our machines.

PS. John Romero was fired a couple of days ago. Very sad.