# ‘The mid-2000s was the golden era of first-person shooters’: David Syzmankski, creator of Dusk and Iron Lung, discusses the games on his PC

- URL: https://talkfuse.com/story/the-mid-2000s-was-the-golden-era-of-first-person-shooters-david-syzmankski-creator-of-dusk-and-iron-lung-discusses-the-games-on-his-pc/
- Published: 2026-07-19T15:00:00+00:00
- Updated: 2026-08-01T09:15:28+00:00
- Original publisher: PC Gamer
- Original article: https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/the-mid-2000s-was-the-golden-era-of-first-person-shooters-david-syzmankski-creator-of-dusk-and-iron-lung-discusses-the-games-on-his-pc/
- Topics: Americas, Entertainment, Gaming

## Key points

- Szymanski calls mid-2000s FPS games the genre’s golden era.
- He values the period’s variety over standardised shooter design.
- Doom, Elden Ring and Infra remain key games on his PC.

## Summary

David Szymanski, the creator of Dusk and Iron Lung, says the late 1990s to mid-2000s were the “golden age” of first-person shooters because the genre offered unusually broad creative variety. Speaking about his Steam library, he contrasted that period with eras dominated first by Doom-like games and later by Call of Duty-style conventions, arguing that freer design produced more distinctive experiences.

Szymanski is currently playing the 2007 shooter Instinct, whose simple, slow-paced design he finds appealing. He cites games including Halo, Half-Life 2, Doom 3, Far Cry, Serious Sam and Painkiller as examples of the era’s diversity; Doom remains his oldest installed game and his choice for the best FPS. His highest Steam playtime is 324 hours in Counter-Strike 2, while he spent 186 hours in Elden Ring, and he keeps Infra installed as a recurring comfort game.

---
Summarised by TalkFuse (https://talkfuse.com/). Quote the original publisher for the reporting and link this page for the summary and discussion.