Duke Nukem Forever demo impressions

[Zixinus]

So I finally got my card for the demo. Interestingly, it gave me a code for Steam! The demo is now in my Steam account.

My first impression is that the game certainly big on playing nostalgia/reminiscent of Duke Nukem 3D, complete with fancy flashback-like things to it.

The game certainly doesn't take itself too seriously. We have EDF troopers acting like obvious idiots, "forever" jokes here and there, some meta-humor at the gameplay (remember the remote for the pipe-bomb? Now's it's a car-remote, it even makes the same noise) and references (so far, I've found a reference to Half-Life).

For a game that has a massive ego on several levels, it certainly wasn't afraid to copy the cooler new kids: you can only carry two weapons at a time and your health regenerates. You can sprint and you can hear how supposedly a massive pile of man-perfection that is Duke start panting after a few seconds (must be all those cigars).

There are two levels in the demo: one is in a stadium (from the end of the DN3D's 3rd episode) and one set partly in a Texas-like canyon-desert, amid the ruins of mining-village (I presume) and some quasi-abandoned mines (there are certainly a lot of lights out).

Following hereon-out are from the demo. They may contain spoilers (although likely minor ones). You have been warned.

First level thoughts:
- You start by pissing. I hope this is only in for the demo, because it's a little... ambivalent (although I guess it does help with juaxtopisition). I've checked and I can't find the turd that was in one of the online videos.
- Some objects are intractable (toilet, sink, soap-dispenser, etc) but not that much. I've certainly found a lot of locked doors.
- You find a lobby with a lot of dead EDF soldiers going over a clearly-bad plan on a whiteboard. You can write on the whiteboard but it's pretty clumsy. The operation in question is aptply named "cock-block" (and is roughly about as effective for a monster that is about the size of an elephant).
- Duke gets thrown back and I just then noticed that the developoers thankfully made Duke's legs and feet visible as he moves (he can be seen in mirrors too). This is a small but much-wanted detail that I don't see in any FPS games.
- You essentially go trough the tutorial and you start by re-enacting the fight from the Stadium level of DN3D. There are is much more closed and wet, visible on the monitor (at least there is the excuse that Duke is wearing glasses as to some of the water effects).
- Fight starts. Your first weapon is a Devastator. It feels... a bit lame. I don't know why. Perhaps because the missiles are slower? Either way, you have less maximum ammo.
- I actually panicked for a second, thinking that I missed something when I ran out of ammo. Guess who saves my ass by supplying ammo? The EDF comes in and drops ammo for me.
- To my surprise the monster has more than the one attack with what he can't hit a moving target for shit. He can dash at me like something out of an animé and make ground-ball-lighting attacks. The boss is definitely a "strafes-alot" type.
- There is a quick-time-event thingy for killing the monster. A part has to be pulled out. After which you press a key to re-enact the scene from DN3D. I was slightly dissapointed, I was hoping that I could aim and kick myself rather than just in a cut-scene.
- After which there is a cutscene which I won't spoil. All I tell that it gives another meta-jokes and shows us the twins (with some rather disgusting noises).

Second mission: you start in a monster truck, as seen in the trailers. At first I thought it was a toy or something, but no. You get turbo and you persue an alien ship. You can road-kill pigcops and dodge boulders.
The controls are what you can expect. I managed though.

When I had to stop, I noticed two things.
I'm with the titutal golden pistol (looks like a heavily-modded M1911).
And I have a usable item: sunglasses. Surprised, I turn it on, wondering why effect could sunglasses would have.
It's an infra-red vision actually and really only suited for night-vision: otherwise the screen is just a white glare.
You fight pig-cops and it's the usual fps-affair when it comes to modern gunfights.
I've found several weapons from DN3D and a new one. You have the pistol, shrink ray (I haven't experimented with it much), the three-barreled (sub?)machine gun, a pump-action shotgun, the RPG and a new weapon, the railgun (a one-shot sniper weapon).

I've discovered two more items: beer and an holoduke.
Beer makes Duke tougher supposedly and also seems to increase his damage.
The Holoduke is also much more useful than in the last game: you turn invisible while you use it, you can shoot and move.

Now, there is an obligatory helicopter-ish killing sequence with rockets. It's more clumsy due to you having to rely on health-regeneration.

Then you go down the mine and explore it, trying to find gas. What struck me is that the mine is strangely well-kept: instead of it being a perfect area for using your infra-red sunglasses, there are plenty of lanterns and lights.

Eventually, after fucking around with some minecarts (again, because our muscle-man can't climb) we get what we came for and we start shooting rodents. We get back to the car, finding some pig-cops trying to vainly destroy it. You shoot them and that's where the demo ends.

Perplexedly, you get a trailer. I find it perplexing because you can only get the demo like me at this point if you pre-ordered it, so why is it encoraging me to pre-order it?

[Lord Woodlouse]

You can also get the demo if you buy GOTY edition of Borderlands. I happened to get that for Christmas, so played the demo yesterday. Was kinda fun, not sure the demo showed the best bits. One of the things I loved about the original was the level design, going around places that at the time felt real and interactive (bear in mind this is Doom and Rise of the Triad era :p ) none of which was really shown in the demo.

[Purple]

Perplexedly, you get a trailer. I find it perplexing because you can only get the demo like me at this point if you pre-ordered it, so why is it encoraging me to pre-order it?

So wait, let me get this strait. The only way to get access to the demo, a program who's sole purpose on this earth it is to entice you to buy the full product is to actually buy said full product. Now, I admit that my knowledge of economics and marketing is limited to 3 years of studding it and hence imperfect. But from what I gather something is definitively a mis there.

For lack of a better term, it's kind of like only getting to see the freaking commercial after you agree to buy the product. How on earth does that make sense?

[Lord Woodlouse]

Perplexedly, you get a trailer. I find it perplexing because you can only get the demo like me at this point if you pre-ordered it, so why is it encoraging me to pre-order it?

So wait, let me get this strait. The only way to get access to the demo, a program who's sole purpose on this earth it is to entice you to buy the full product is to actually buy said full product. Now, I admit that my knowledge of economics and marketing is limited to 3 years of studding it and hence imperfect. But from what I gather something is definitively a mis there.

For lack of a better term, it's kind of like only getting to see the freaking commercial after you agree to buy the product. How on earth does that make sense?

It's early access to the demo, I'm sure the demo will be given a universal release.

[Stark]

Given something as a pre-order sweetener encourages pre-orders, which is why they give out these bonuses in the first place. They're trying to reduce risk.

[Executor32]

I take it you didn't check the regular toilets? There's a turd in each of them. It's worth picking one up just to hear Duke's comments on the act.

[Zaune]

I take it you didn't check the regular toilets? There's a turd in each of them. It's worth picking one up just to hear Duke's comments on the act.

This sounds like the kind of game I would have really enjoyed at the age I was when the original Duke 3D was released. Sadly, my tolerance for bodily-function jokes and cheesy one-liners is not what it once was.

[CaptHawkeye]

This game will sell millions and become one of the most popular shooters in history literally because of how retarded its developers were. What's wrong with this picture?

[Zixinus]

I take it you didn't check the regular toilets? There's a turd in each of them. It's worth picking one up just to hear Duke's comments on the act.

I checked and found nothing (that's where I first checked actually). Although I only passed it once, so I might have missed it.

This game will sell millions and become one of the most popular shooters in history literally because of how retarded its developers were. What's wrong with this picture?

"Childish" and "crass" is not the same as "retarded". Yeah, the game has a few gimmicks but it's not like gimmicks are unique in the gaming industry.

As for "popular" and "sell millions" that's partly because of it's predecessor (DN3D which is a fairly good game, especially for it's time) and the nostalgia factor. Remind me, which game that has a similar history and reputation that doesn't exploit it?

Besides, from what I played, the game isn't bad. Not quite what I expected, but the gameplay itself doesn't seem bad or terribly flawed.

[CaptHawkeye]

Did you look up when that point whisked over your head? Let's be honest, if DNF hadn't been in development for 10+ years, becoming the literal post child of vaporware, would anyone care about it today? It's an ancient shooter based on ancient game design that has been out of use for years.

But oh it's the infamous Duke Nukem Forever everyone will be curious to see it. They'll all buy it for the same reason everyone made fun of, and then subsequently bought Snuggies and Shake Weights. It turns out consumers are massively hypocritical? Gasp.

[Lord Woodlouse]

Did you look up when that point whisked over your head? Let's be honest, if DNF hadn't been in development for 10+ years, becoming the literal post child of vaporware, would anyone care about it today? It's an ancient shooter based on ancient game design that has been out of use for years.

But oh it's the infamous Duke Nukem Forever everyone will be curious to see it. They'll all buy it for the same reason everyone made fun of, and then subsequently bought Snuggies and Shake Weights. It turns out consumers are massively hypocritical? Gasp.

*shrug* The game is entertaining enough, and uses a number of modern gaming innovations. It's not exactly a re-skinned DN3D. There was high demand for it before it became a joke of a development. This isn't actually a 14 year old game, ultimately, it's a game who's development has had a multitude of false-starts and lacked the resources to finish in a timely manner until recently. At all times the developer said it would be done when it was done, never presuming to give any kind of release date. It genuinely puzzles me why this long development cycle should anger anybody.

If people decide to buy it BECAUSE it's been in development for so long... meh... that's their choice, why get in a flap about it?

[Zixinus]

Did you look up when that point whisked over your head?

No, I just ignored it because how inane it was.

Yeah, a game has hype that is somewhat bullshit. Tell me something new please.

Also, may we talk about the game rather than it's advertising? Because in the end, that's what matters, not what some stupid marketeers thought up and lied about because that's what the entire game industry does.

Let's be honest, if DNF hadn't been in development for 10+ years, becoming the literal post child of vaporware, would anyone care about it today?

Why wouldn't they? People cared about Doom 3. People still care about Postal, Final Fantasy, etc. Maybe DNF wouldn't be talked about the same way, certainly but I don't see how it would be ignored as you imply it would be.

[DaveJB]

This isn't actually a 14 year old game, ultimately, it's a game who's development has had a multitude of false-starts and lacked the resources to finish in a timely manner until recently. At all times the developer said it would be done when it was done, never presuming to give any kind of release date.

The only technical or financial obstacle they had during the game's development (at least until 3DRealms went bankrupt) was early on, when it turned out that the Quake II engine basically didn't work at all for what they wanted it to do, which resulted in them switching over to the Unreal engine. Once that was out of the way, they could easily have released it in 2001 or 2002, had they actually made a push for it.

The real problem they had was a combination of egomania and totally unrealistic expectations on the part of George Broussard, and Scott Miller being too spineless to reel him in. Wired did a good article on it here so I won't go into any more detail, but 3DRealms had no-one to blame but themselves for their failure to complete the game.

[Stark]

Have you guys played the full game? 'Awful' doesn't describe it. The real puzzle is how they got such small levels, huge load times and ugly graphics out of UE3!

I'm sure we're all glad that overlong gimmick sections and platform puzzles have made a comeback.

[Artemas]

man, the demo was fucking horrid

literally the most fun part was drawing on the whiteboard

[Zixinus]

What's so awful about it? It's not bad and I find it fun.

Or are you guys just acting like cool kids, dishing the hot new game out?

[Stark]

Are you acting like cool kids, jumping on the next hype bandwagon?

The game is nearly devoid of music and features platform puzzles and no prompts, so players get to spend time in near complete silence hitting everything in sight with their gun. The gunplay is late-90s awfulness (only with fewer guns and lower ammo limits), the bosses laughable worse-than-8-bit repetition, the gimmick sections go on far too long (particularly given the lack of music, guidance, or anything to do) and I haven't found an element of gameplay that isn't intentionally clunky. Seesaw puzzles? Case closed.

The technical misuse of the engine - where everything looks like dogshit, has awful textures and somehow takes ages to load AND had tex popin - is probably the best part of a terrible game.

Hilariously, this game is reviewing extremely well. I bet anyone out there could find a game that rates lower on metacritic that they've played and blows Duke out of the water.

High point of the game? Knowing that now Gearbox can make Colonial Marines.

[white_rabbit]

This game is fucking boring.

I don't know how they managed to make it look like shit with modern technology, but they achieved it.

I watched my brother as he started it up and played for a bit. We got some laughs out of the intro and presentation and so forth, it was looking okay, put up with the massive load time (seriously, what the fuck is going on in the background to require a load time like that ? I couldn't see anything) and finally got playing the game.

Boss fight was uninspired and boring, everything about it was MEH. The death animation/field goal kick just fell completely flat.

From then on, it was 30 minutes of sheer fucking boredom. Musical scoring was...wait for it, uninspired and boring, similarly sound effects and so forth.

Basically this game is a bunch of vaguely amusing sequences (but often boring sequences instead of amusing)wrapped up in a mostly boring shooter. It tries so desperately to distract you with all the duke fetishism, but it doesn't work.

I vaguely recall pirahna games are involved in Duke Nukem, so now that its done, can they please go make Mechwarrior, and not take anything derived from duke with them ?

[Zixinus]

Are you acting like cool kids, jumping on the next hype bandwagon?

How about acting like someone who tries to judge a game on it's own merits?

I can't say that the game is incredibly good, that I grant. However, I don't see how it's terribly bad either. The gunplay mostly works, I don't know what you complain about the graphics (it looks like most shooters out) and the loading times seem normal to me: about 2 to 10 seconds at most.

Yeah, the carry-only-two weapons does seem annoying as well as having relatively low ammo for them (although some of the weapons have about as much ammo as their DN3D counterpart) but the problem is rather than they feel less effective. Enemies don't stun or freeze like they did in DN3D when shot.

Still, there is effort to make the pacing work: those "gimmicky" sections are there usually after big fights. The game is your typical linear movie-style action game.

[Stark]

I guess you'll show me where MW2 makes players fuck around with cranes/statues/seesaws in between fights with no prompting and no alternative way forward, then, or stretches incredibly boring RC car sections into two full levels. Cause it seems to me that DNF is just backwards, ugly and shit.

The gunplay 'works' because they realised they had to significantly limit the number of badguys due to the awful guns. They could have done something actually interesting with the assault captains instead of just replicated Duke 3D, you know? Or not had the worst UE3 graphics combined with the smallest levels and the longest load times.

As you apporach the DukeDome, the level design becomes amazingly bad, with primitive terrain, near-zero interactivity, indestructible waist-high barriers, awful incidental textures, and boring scripted events. That this 'rates' higher than actual top-tier releases is hilarious.

[DaveJB]

I don't know how they managed to make it look like shit with modern technology, but they achieved it.

It isn't really what you could call "modern" technology, though. Apparently all Gearbox did was take the build of the game that 3DRealms had in early-mid 2009, finish it up and released it. Moreover, from what I understand DNF doesn't use Unreal Engine 3 - it's some sort of hybrid of the Unreal Tournament 2004 engine and a custom graphics renderer.

Anyway, let's face it, the only reason why this game's getting released at all is probably because Randy Pitchford wanted to see if there was still a market for Duke Nukem, and worked out that finishing DNF was much cheaper and simpler than building a complete new game from scratch.

[Stark]

That would explain a great deal. The splash just says 'Unreal engine', but it's it's a hackjob 2004-era engine, that might explain why the simple reflections and lighting apparently struggle so much.

The best thing I forgot about Duke Nukem; the voice actor sounds like he's asleep, and delivers all the lines ripped off Evil Dead in an utterly bland monotone.


'Come.... get... some. If you like. No rush.'

[Chardok]

I've decided that I hate DNF. And I'll tell you why:

Look at Duke Nukem forever.

Now look at your copy of Borderlands.

Now back at Duke Nukem Forever.

*Realize that is the reason there is not a copy of Borderlands 2 in your game rack.*


I think we're done here.

[Stark]

Don't forget Aliens: Colonial Marines.

[Chardok]

Don't forget Aliens: Colonial Marines.

Please fall in a well.