Why didn't I get this delivered to the office? I could be playing this now, but all I have is a 'you weren't in, ring this number' note on my doorstep!
Time taken (With messing around): little less than 8 hours.
Parts I liked most: Monster Truck driving, final battle. Game isn't too challenging at normal difficulty. No jetpack or scuba gear in SP, not surprising after realizing it's "on rails".
Plays like: Halo with a strong Duke theme and puzzles. (Can only hold 2 weapons, 2 types of explosives, regenerating health, VERY linear) Plenty of games referenced such as Halo and Dead Space.
Briefly tried the multiplayer. * VOIP is always on ingame, no mute or ability to completely turn it off apart from sliding the volume down. * very laggy even as the server self * plenty of game modes
Verdict: Duke is back, forget about Duke3D, DNF is a console port, take it slow and enjoy the show.
I'm about 3 hours into the game. Absolutely terrible. Really can't believe how shoddy it is.
I have to respectfully disagree with Zaggy and say that Duke isn't back. Some poor, lacklustre imitation has been sent in his place. I'm going back to Duke3D.
<!--QuoteBegin-"Anon"+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE ("Anon")</div><div class='quotemain'><!--QuoteEBegin-->I think the change in atmosphere from previous Duke games makes sense when you realize that the people who are making Duke Nukem Forever and the people who are buying Duke Nukem forever are the same exact people who bought and played the first games, almost a decade and a half later. DNF is quite literally a mid-life crisis.
It's been fourteen years since the last time Duke did anything. He can't run as fast or as far as he used to. He can't carry as many guns as he used to. He can't take a bullet as well as he used to. The frat-boy sensibility about women from the previous games has darkened to a sense of fear and no small resentment (the pregnancy motif in the Alien level is important here- regretting having children, Duke?) The game's willingness to make fun of its protagonist even as it supports him is completely gone, because its desperate clawing after virility cannot tolerate that.
For a game sold as a comedy, it takes the fight to preserve the masculinity and youth of its main character incredibly seriously, not realizing that the fight is already lost. When a vehicle breaks down on Duke Nukem, he responds "Aw, and it got such good gas mileage." That is not a thing Schwarzenegger or Van Damme or Bruce Campbell would say in the films Duke Nukem is supposed to be parodying. That is a thing your dad says when the Volvo is beyond repair.
Duke Nukem Forever is a game about an aging sexually insecure man, made by an aging sexually insecure man, sold to an audience of aging sexually insecure men, which perfectly captures their anxieties. Duke Nukem Forever is art.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
---
On a totally unrelated note: <center><object width="450" height="356"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/B2jl-RBXEx4"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/B2jl-RBXEx4" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="450" height="356"></embed></object></center>
Here's some more from probably not the same person: <!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Duke3D homaged/parodied 80s/early 90s action films by making the villains such ridiculous villain caricatures that Duke was an acceptable protagonist by comparison.
Roddy Piper and Snake Plissken are goddamn psychopaths in They Live and Escape from NY, but the point of the films is that society is so broken that these guys can thrive. It's a deliberate part of the films, presenting extreme cynicism (Snake ignores a rape-in-progress because he's that desensitized and amoral) with a smattering of dark humor (Snake's nickname apparently comes from his ###### tattoo).
Duke 3D's pig cops were in a context where the Rodney King beating and the LA riots were still fresh in people's minds. Not only that, but the villains behind the pigs were basically rapists - the cheesy "mars needs women" premise getting a gruesome subversion with the Aliens-referencing outcome. Duke 3D didn't joke about the rape. It treated rape as a serious problem equivalent to racism and class warfare, to which Duke was a source of catharsis if not any actual social change. (Duke is was a parodic figure specifically because, despite being a working-class shmoe, he's so unenlightened that he's exclusively driven by basic urges to ###### and kill.)
The women and civilians in Duke 3D were just "normal" people doing their jobs, even if they are strippers or whatever. In other words, they're us. They're the folks feeling oppressed by the government corruption and other social ills, who are crying out for a populist hero to save them. That Duke is ultimately an idiot gave the game a measure of honest-to-god complexity.
DNF treats these "normal" characters with relentless and utter contempt.
Any pretense that Duke was a working-class hero have been dropped, as now he's a apparently a billionaire in a solid-gold penthouse with a ###### throne. The aliens no longer represent police corruption or the patriarchy, but rather, "foreign cultures" (see: the WMD joke). And, obviously, they joke about the rape now because the people being raped are no longer audience stand-ins, but rather a bunch of semi-conscious inhuman inferiors.
(What makes the Olsen twins so objectionable that they need to get taken down several pegs anyways? Besides that they're female, of course. Since when did they represent "wholesomeness" and why is wholesomeness the enemy now?)
The aliens are basically now equivalent to Duke. The line separating him from the baddies is altogether erased. He's not defending anything good, even accidentally, because instead of reacting against the status quo (however clumsily) Duke is the status quo now. And it's ###### unbearable.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
<!--quoteo(post=1852418:date=Jun 13 2011, 08:14 PM:name=Align)--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE (Align @ Jun 13 2011, 08:14 PM) <a href="index.php?act=findpost&pid=1852418"><{POST_SNAPBACK}></a></div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Here's some more from probably not the same person:<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->Links to both, please. :)
Comments
Sad times :(
Time taken (With messing around): little less than 8 hours.
Parts I liked most: Monster Truck driving, final battle.
Game isn't too challenging at normal difficulty.
No jetpack or scuba gear in SP, not surprising after realizing it's "on rails".
Plays like: Halo with a strong Duke theme and puzzles. (Can only hold 2 weapons, 2 types of explosives, regenerating health, VERY linear)
Plenty of games referenced such as Halo and Dead Space.
Briefly tried the multiplayer.
* VOIP is always on ingame, no mute or ability to completely turn it off apart from sliding the volume down.
* very laggy even as the server self
* plenty of game modes
Verdict: Duke is back, forget about Duke3D, DNF is a console port, take it slow and enjoy the show.
I have to respectfully disagree with Zaggy and say that Duke isn't back. Some poor, lacklustre imitation has been sent in his place. I'm going back to Duke3D.
It's been fourteen years since the last time Duke did anything. He can't run as fast or as far as he used to. He can't carry as many guns as he used to. He can't take a bullet as well as he used to. The frat-boy sensibility about women from the previous games has darkened to a sense of fear and no small resentment (the pregnancy motif in the Alien level is important here- regretting having children, Duke?) The game's willingness to make fun of its protagonist even as it supports him is completely gone, because its desperate clawing after virility cannot tolerate that.
For a game sold as a comedy, it takes the fight to preserve the masculinity and youth of its main character incredibly seriously, not realizing that the fight is already lost. When a vehicle breaks down on Duke Nukem, he responds "Aw, and it got such good gas mileage." That is not a thing Schwarzenegger or Van Damme or Bruce Campbell would say in the films Duke Nukem is supposed to be parodying. That is a thing your dad says when the Volvo is beyond repair.
Duke Nukem Forever is a game about an aging sexually insecure man, made by an aging sexually insecure man, sold to an audience of aging sexually insecure men, which perfectly captures their anxieties. Duke Nukem Forever is art.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
---
On a totally unrelated note:
<center><object width="450" height="356"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/B2jl-RBXEx4"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/B2jl-RBXEx4" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" width="450" height="356"></embed></object></center>
<!--quoteo--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE </div><div class='quotemain'><!--quotec-->Duke3D homaged/parodied 80s/early 90s action films by making the villains such ridiculous villain caricatures that Duke was an acceptable protagonist by comparison.
Roddy Piper and Snake Plissken are goddamn psychopaths in They Live and Escape from NY, but the point of the films is that society is so broken that these guys can thrive. It's a deliberate part of the films, presenting extreme cynicism (Snake ignores a rape-in-progress because he's that desensitized and amoral) with a smattering of dark humor (Snake's nickname apparently comes from his ###### tattoo).
Duke 3D's pig cops were in a context where the Rodney King beating and the LA riots were still fresh in people's minds. Not only that, but the villains behind the pigs were basically rapists - the cheesy "mars needs women" premise getting a gruesome subversion with the Aliens-referencing outcome. Duke 3D didn't joke about the rape. It treated rape as a serious problem equivalent to racism and class warfare, to which Duke was a source of catharsis if not any actual social change. (Duke is was a parodic figure specifically because, despite being a working-class shmoe, he's so unenlightened that he's exclusively driven by basic urges to ###### and kill.)
The women and civilians in Duke 3D were just "normal" people doing their jobs, even if they are strippers or whatever. In other words, they're us. They're the folks feeling oppressed by the government corruption and other social ills, who are crying out for a populist hero to save them. That Duke is ultimately an idiot gave the game a measure of honest-to-god complexity.
DNF treats these "normal" characters with relentless and utter contempt.
Any pretense that Duke was a working-class hero have been dropped, as now he's a apparently a billionaire in a solid-gold penthouse with a ###### throne. The aliens no longer represent police corruption or the patriarchy, but rather, "foreign cultures" (see: the WMD joke). And, obviously, they joke about the rape now because the people being raped are no longer audience stand-ins, but rather a bunch of semi-conscious inhuman inferiors.
(What makes the Olsen twins so objectionable that they need to get taken down several pegs anyways? Besides that they're female, of course. Since when did they represent "wholesomeness" and why is wholesomeness the enemy now?)
The aliens are basically now equivalent to Duke. The line separating him from the baddies is altogether erased. He's not defending anything good, even accidentally, because instead of reacting against the status quo (however clumsily) Duke is the status quo now. And it's ###### unbearable.<!--QuoteEnd--></div><!--QuoteEEnd-->
The little skit they get into at around 31 minutes in makes me laugh, and I haven't even played the game.
I *would* play the game they end up describing, however.
<a href="http://notch.tumblr.com/post/6736474534/duke-nukem-forever-review" target="_blank">http://notch.tumblr.com/post/6736474534/du...-forever-review</a>