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# Iron Designer Challenge with John Romero


- **Date:** Friday, Sep 25, 2026
- **Time:** 12:30–14:30 (120 min)
- **Room:** Stage 14
- **Event:** World Congress 2026 North America

## Description

How do great ideas survive contact with reality?

In this fast-paced, highly interactive workshop, John Romero puts participants through a series of creative design challenges built around real-world problems. Working in small teams, participants will invent apps, tools, services, and digital experiences designed to solve specific problems and then adapt those ideas as new constraints, technical limitations, user needs, business pressures, and unexpected complications are introduced.

The goal is not to arrive at the “right” solution. It is to think creatively under pressure, make decisions quickly, communicate ideas clearly, and keep improving a concept as the problem changes.

Teams will create a solution, change it, change it again, and ultimately pitch their final concept to the room. Along the way, John will draw on decades of experience building games, teams, and technology to challenge assumptions, introduce twists, and explore how creative ideas evolve through iteration.

At the end, one team will emerge as the Iron Designer (with a certificate to prove it).

No game development experience is required—just curiosity, imagination, and a willingness to rethink your best idea five minutes after you came up with it.

## Speaker

### [John Romero](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/@john-romero)

Legendary Game Creator | Father of FPS | DOOM, Quake, Wolfenstein


## Related talks at this congress

- [Life in Games: Four Decades of Code](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1908-life-in-games-four) — John Romero
- [From Idea to Production with AI: Agentic Development in Practice](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1418-from-idea-to) — Daniel Ostrovsky
- [RoboCoders: Judgment Day: AI-Assisted Engineering Applied - The Battle of Agents](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1697-robocoders-judgment) — Baruch Sadogursky, Viktor Gamov
- [The AI-Native Engineer: From Business Problem to Prototype](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/events/world-congress-2026-north-america/sessions/1945-the-ai-native) — Srishti Agrawal, Sidarth Aurora

## Watch remotely

Can’t make it to San José? Watch this session live with Pro. You also get:

- All full videos, bookmarks, and playlists
- World Congress livestreams

[See pricing](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/pricing)

## Links

- [Get tickets](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/world-congress-north-america/tickets)