John Carmack sues Zenimax for $22.5m

John Carmack is suing Zenimax for a whopping $22.5m, claiming the company still owes him an outstanding fee as part of its acquisition of id Software in 2009.

The lawsuit, filed with a Texas court yesterday, has spun out of the $150m acquisition of the company that Carmack founded, along with three others. Carmack stayed on at id Software under Zenimax for four more years, before leaving to become the CTO of Oculus VR.

Carmack alleges that he was due to receive $45.1m as the majority shareholder in the company, half in Zenimax shares and half in cash. Carmack says that while he received the Zenimax shares, the other half still hasn’t been paid.

Carmack and ZeniMax have only just finished their previous legal tussle, with an essential part of ZeniMax’s lawsuit against Oculus being accusations that Carmack stole code and documents from Zenimax. The lawsuit states that these "claimed violations of Mr Carmack’s Employment Agreement and ZeniMax’s alleged intellectual property rights" are a large part of why Zenimax isn’t paying up. Zenimax have claimed the lawsuit is without merit, so it seems like the pair is going to have to clash in court again.

The Dallas Morning News have uploaded a full docket for the suit.