Let's All Be Nice to Duke Nukem Forever

[Andy of Comix Inc]

Moreso than liking other games people don't like. When I say I liked Superman 64, for example, no-one bats an eyelid.

I believe you are lying, playing the hipster card of "I like this because everyone else hates it."

Superman 64 was an unholy beast of a game that ended up being completely unplayable.

I'm giving an example, I didn't actually like Superman 64. My point was, that if I mention I like a completely broken, unplayable game, I don't get half the shit I do for saying I liked DNF. It's stupid. If I say I liked Too Human, I'd probably even get PRAISE from the cult following of fans its amassed. And DNF is at least better than Too Human...

 

[evilneko]

I honestly can't think of anything nice to say about Duke Forever.

Um.

Its graphics are better than Duke 3D.

There I said something nice about it.

 

[Andy of Comix Inc]

Now lets not mince words, DNF is terrible, but try to think subjectively and view each of it's aspects and qualities separately.

No game is truly terrible. Surely this was your point.

So why did you throw this sentence in.

I honestly can't think of anything nice to say about Duke Forever.

You didn't even think the EGO system was a cute idea? I can think of a few nice things to say about Duke Nukem Forever from a purely conceptual standpoint.

 

[MGlBlaze]

The game in and of itself wasn't that bad; perhaps bland and boring a lot of the time, but it had some fun moments.

What I have a problem with is that Duke is a misogynist asshole. Before people say he was before; no, he wasn't. Before he was just an idiot, and he was funny like that, but before DN:F he did seem to genuinely care about women in his own way.

In DN:F?
"Guess you're fucked."

What.

And that's just one of the truly monstrous comments he has in the game. Another one that stands out in my mind is "Guess he won't be in the sequel.", the target of which was a supposed well-liked comrade that just died slowly and painfully.

 

[JemothSkarii]

Let's not, Duke Nukem Forever was a rushed piece of shit. Yes a game 14 years in development was rushed.

Shit can rust? I never knew that

OT: I got the Balls of Steel version, and I've enjoyed it, mainly because I hold extremely low expectations for games. VoiceActing on Jon St. Jon's part was the best for me.
Trivia: Jon St Jon voiced Big the Cat in Sonic Adventures.
You can now never look at Big the Cat OR Duke the same way.

 

[JemothSkarii]

EDIT: How did I read that so badly? Sorry, kill'd the quote

OT: I got the Balls of Steel version, and I've enjoyed it, mainly because I hold extremely low expectations for games. VoiceActing on Jon St. Jon's part was the best for me.
Trivia: Jon St Jon voiced Big the Cat in Sonic Adventures.
You can now never look at Big the Cat OR Duke the same way.[/quote]

 

[Rawne1980]

The problem I had with it was I loved the old Duke games.

I loved them in the 90's.

The 90's is where DNF seems to be stuck.

I've since left behind my teen years and picking up random turds is no longer amusing. When i'm expected to wait for 12 years for a game I expect amazing, not average.

It may be me having stupidly high standards but you would think that after 12 years in development we would have got something better than DNF was.

It was alright but if it takes them 12 years to make a game that can't even be classed as good then what hope do they have?

 

[ExileNZ]

Haven't played it, but don't much care for all the hate. I'm just going to wait until it's a more reasonable price before I get it (probably bargain bin, I've got 5 years of high-end games to catch up on).

 

[PizzaSHARK]

unlikeable main character, bad gameplay, bad acting, bad graphics bad.....yeah I'm gonna stop while I'm ahead.

DID YOU TAKE NOTHING FROM MY OP ;-;

...the gameplay was fine, if you like that sort of thing. The acting was actually pretty good, at least on Jon St. John's end. The graphics were well-rendered (though the majority of human characters looked and were animated atrociously), the environments were staggeringly varied (and that's objective, no-one can say the progression of hotel - Las Vegas casino - alien hive - strip club - burger bar is "unvaried," despite the muddy brown look that tied them all together).

Duke Nukem is a parody of Duke Nukem. It doesn't need a plot, and if it has one, it's because it's parodying one. A plot half-baked because that's the joke, compared to a plot that was messy because Bioware wanted a trilogy so rushed to fill in Part II, comes out on top, to be honest.

The gameplay was trash. It was trying to be an actual shooter with resource management (ammo management, medpack management) while trying to appeal to the morons that play modern shooters (regenerating health so you don't have to keep track of medpacks, can only carry a couple weapons so you never need to worry about reserving ammo for a specific need, etc... basically less thought involved) at the same time, and the result was that it sucked at both.

The plot, characters, and everything else don't fuckin matter. It's a Duke Nukem game, if you're expecting a good plot and interesting characters, you're an idiot.

And don't try to pretend DNF was a parody of Duke Nukem - that's a line of shit that's long enough to circle Earth twice. DNF was a rush job by Gearbox to try and make some quick money by stringing together the twenty different bits twenty different developers worked on, and to try and get some money out of people letting nostalgia getting the better of them.

DNF is probably worth $15 or $20. More than that, no. If you're gonna spend $60 on a shooter, at least buy one of the many different modernized shooters at that price tag - at least you know you're getting something consistent that way.

 

[Flare Phoenix]

Really? You can't understand that the legacy behind the game was far greater than any actual game could hope to aspire to? That the game was far more interesting as a running joke amongst the gaming community than as an actual product?

It's called hype; everyone wanted to see the game finally released, and they wanted it to be epic to give this story a happy conclusion. If this was a game that had had a standard development game, people would have played it, not liked it/thought it was okay and moved onto the next game to come out.

 

[Sifter49]

To be perfectly honest, I was disappointed when I actually picked up the game from pre-order (placed when the very first bit of news confirmed it was real). To be fair, the game isn't Satan's hemorrhoid raping you in hell, Too Human, Kane and Lynch 2, Superman 64, and Dragon Ages 2 gladly share that title. What can be said of DNF is that, despite the fact that it was overly hyped to an insane degree, the game itself is a change from cover based shooting and grey sidewalks. The humor may be primitive, but at least it has a sense of humor. Also, I recall this being the only game that lets you throw feces. I was disappointed by this too when I tried to pelt people with a turd and it didn't even stain them, but it's till fun to throw around, like DNF itself.

 

[Valdsator]

What I have a problem with is that Duke is a misogynist asshole. Before people say he was before; no, he wasn't. Before he was just an idiot, and he was funny like that, but before DN:F he did seem to genuinely care about women in his own way.

In DN:F?
"Guess you're fucked."

What.

And that's just one of the truly monstrous comments he has in the game. Another one that stands out in my mind is "Guess he won't be in the sequel.", the target of which was a supposed well-liked comrade that just died slowly and painfully.

Exactly. Gearbox really screwed up Duke in his personality. He's not some douche bag who makes dumb sex jokes, he's a hero who says one liners occasionally... Some parts were pretty funny to me, like when he goes "BZZZzzzzzz" after completing a puzzle to shut off a fan thing. It was just silly humor that didn't have to be all "WE'RE DANCING ON TEH LINE LOL."

3D Realms needs to write the jokes when they make the next Duke game.

 

[Andy of Comix Inc]

DNF was a rush job by Gearbox to try and make some quick money by stringing together the twenty different bits twenty different developers worked on, and to try and get some money out of people letting nostalgia getting the better of them.

DNF is probably worth $15 or $20. More than that, no. If you're gonna spend $60 on a shooter, at least buy one of the many different modernized shooters at that price tag - at least you know you're getting something consistent that way.

I paid $100. That's right: $100. I live in Australia. That's common. But don't you dare complain a game isn't worth $60 when I'm in the room.

As for Gearbox... you do know that 3D Realms refugees came to Gearbox? They're situated, like, down the street from each other. It was basically a 3D Realms project through and through, and they just moved building for the last year or so.

I don't buy that the gunplay wasn't solid. Because it was. In an FPS, that's half the work done. Especially on higher difficulties, that shit gets genuinely intense. The health system worked fine because you could still gain health from, say, executing enemies, and the two-weapon system worked because levels were designed around it. Was it patronising and silly? Yeah. It was. But didn't make it less fun. Not for me, anyway.

What I have a problem with is that Duke is a misogynist asshole. Before people say he was before; no, he wasn't. Before he was just an idiot, and he was funny like that, but before DN:F he did seem to genuinely care about women in his own way.

In DN:F?
"Guess you're fucked."

What.

And that's just one of the truly monstrous comments he has in the game. Another one that stands out in my mind is "Guess he won't be in the sequel.", the target of which was a supposed well-liked comrade that just died slowly and painfully.

Exactly. Gearbox really screwed up Duke in his personality. He's not some douche bag who makes dumb sex jokes, he's a hero who says one liners occasionally... Some parts were pretty funny to me, like when he goes "BZZZzzzzzz" after completing a puzzle to shut off a fan thing. It was just silly humor that didn't have to be all "WE'RE DANCING ON TEH LINE LOL."

3D Realms needs to write the jokes when they make the next Duke game.

Okay, yes. Duke Nukem was an unlikable douche. But at least he was unlikable because he was written that way, and not because he was voiced by Nolan North...? ...no, you've got a good point there. Didn't bother me, because I grew up on South Park and nothing offends me any more in the slightest. But it was definitely without point.

 

[AndyFromMonday]

It had alien tits? Seriously though, DNF is one of the worst games released since fucking Daikatana.

 

[teh_Canape]

anybody else play the game on the hardest difficulty and notice that anything you throw was an instakill? That was interesting.

I did

it was pretty fun killing folks by throwing a bust at them

though I didn't play through the unlockable difficulty =P

In DN:F?
"Guess you're fucked."

idk, man

what I got from that line, and the continuation, was that he said it like he thought he could've saved them

but that they died in front of him, which made him flick the shit and genuinely got pissed against the aliens (noticeable when he screams, both times, in the hive and the hotel)

 

[Wuggy]

Or let's voice our opinions however the hell we want to? Yeah, that sounds much better.

For the record, I didn't buy or play a second of DNF, it could be great for all I know. The point is that you shouldn't try to limit people from voicing their opinions. "Hey it wasn't THAT bad!", maybe it wasn't, but people can call it worse than cancer for all I care. What YOU can do is argue why they're wrong.

I do understand where you're coming from though. I personally liked Dragon Age 2 quite a bit, and it was panned for months on end after it was released. I can see the game's strenghts where others cannot, but I'm fine with it and I'll leave it at that.

 

[Asuka Soryu]

I can understand liking DNF, I picked up a copy since it's under 30$ Hey, it's part of Gaming History. But geez, Superman Ring Circus 64?

 

[Mafoobula]

DNF... was it bad? Nah, not BAD. Was it good? Kinda. Worth $50? Um... maybe $40.. $30 is preferable though.
I really think there's potential here to bring Duke into the new age with grace while still keeping all the best parts of the old-school intact.

 

[Dukenstein]

As a huge Duke fan obviously I had a lot of fun with it. It had some really good aspects and really bad aspects. I hated the missions when on the streets, felt like playing halo..but when you get to the dam its just awesome to the max. I am now waiting on SS3 and Duke Reloaded if that ever happens.

 

[PizzaSHARK]

I paid $100. That's right: $100. I live in Australia. That's common. But don't you dare complain a game isn't worth $60 when I'm in the room.

...

I don't buy that the gunplay wasn't solid. Because it was. In an FPS, that's half the work done. Especially on higher difficulties, that shit gets genuinely intense. The health system worked fine because you could still gain health from, say, executing enemies, and the two-weapon system worked because levels were designed around it. Was it patronising and silly? Yeah. It was. But didn't make it less fun. Not for me, anyway.

So you paid about $98 USD for a game that's worth about $15 or $20. That makes you seem a little warped, man. Maybe that's just what all those beaches and venoms do to a man.

The gunplay was crap. But then again, if it isn't Q3A, UT2k4, Painkiller, or Serious Sam, its gunplay is crap. Sorry, I just judge games by the best possible examples of their genre, rather than by the crappy Call of Duty games and even worse Halo games.

Only two weapons at a time and regenerating health, and that didn't bother the fuck out of you? Did you not play Duke3D? I was honestly expecting Duke, of all franchises, to revive the old-school medpack-based gameplay where you carry an entire armory with you and you have to decide how to manage your ammo. Instead, we got just another stupid, simplified-for-the-fratboys modern shooter that basically means you only get to the guns that the enemies are using unless you like running out of ammo. Yeah, you'll find rocket launchers and freeze rays and shit positioned here or there when they want to go "hey dude here's a sniper rifle now go shoot that big pile of exploding barrels near the pigcop squad to watch it all go booooooom!" (say that sentence really fast for maximum effect), but you'll throw it away for a shotgun, assault rifle, or submachine gun the second you're done using it for that set-piece because, again, you use what the enemies are using.

Managing medpacks is also done away with by regenerating health - just hide behind a chest high wall for a few seconds. Wait, Duke's HIDING from the aliens? The fuck is this shit!?

And most importantly, since there's no possibility of finding a mega-health or that really rare ammo for your belt-mounted pelvic thrust death ray, there's no reason to explore, either. That's something that both Painkiller and Serious Sam have, and what I feel is horribly missing from modern shooters. You can spend combined hours exploring every nook and cranny in the SS games and in Painkiller, just looking for goodies. Medpacks, rare ammo, or even weapons before you're supposed to get them in Serious Sam (you can find a Rocket Launcher well before you're "supposed" to get one and it makes the highest difficulty levels actually doable), or the rare doohickeys in Painkiller that help you earn cards and unlock slots.

Maybe it's just my mindset. I absolutely DESPISE (imagine that in massive, pulsing red letters) modern shooters and what they represent. The pinnacle of single-player/co-op shooters is Painkiller and Serious Sam, while the pinnacle of multiplayer shooters would be Q3A and UT2k4 (take your pick, I'm a UT guy myself.) They're fun, action-packed, and in the case of Serious Sam, almost like ballet with guns at the highest difficulty settings (where you're basically a one hitpoint wonder.)