[3][2] Willits has stated in numerous interviews that he was inspired to make video games when he downloaded a shareware version of Doom.

[2][4][5] He joined id Software in 1995 after impressing the owners and development team with Doom levels he forged in his spare time and distributed free over the Internet.

[8] Willits received attention in August 2017 for claiming that he created the concept of multiplayer maps during the development of Quake.

Romero also noted that Marathon and Rise of the Triad, first person shooters which predated Quake by over a year, both shipped with maps exclusive to multiplayer.

Tom Hall, co-founder of id Software and director of Rise of the Triad, gave his support for Romero.

[11] Willits responded to the article by posting an early video of a map fragment with elements of Q1DM3 shown named Tim14.bsp on his Instagram, and stated that "I stand by what I said".