Duke Nukem Forever

[Mad Melvin]

Well, it's finally here. I pre-ordered that bitch a few months ago and it's waiting for me in my mailbox. I hope it doesn't suck. I've read some positive comments about it, at least.

Anyone play it yet, or does anyone even care?

[Fathom Zero]

Only Europe has it at the moment. I think it comes out Tuesday in the US.

[Mad Melvin]

Been playing it for about an hour. It's Duke allright. Straight from the 90s. Except for the graphics, everything is from the 90s. I like the interactive stuff, but the shooting itself is kinda dull at the moment. I'm still very early in the game, but it seems like this game was released about 8-10 years too late.

[Mad Melvin]

Ok, i'll take it back. The more I play this, the more fun it gets. It really does remind me about the fun I used to have with the original Duke. The difficulty level is hard, but the weapons are nicely balanced and powerful, so you never feel helpless. The beginning of the game is a bit boring, or maybe I just wasn't in the right mindset yet. Really refreshing to play such an over the top, balls to the wall shooter that doesn't take itself too seriously.

Now if you'll excuse me, I gotta make some bacon out of those pesky piggies.

[Dr. Boogie]

How does it compare to Halflife 2, because the demo made it seem like they were following that formula awfully close.

[Mad Melvin]

It's similar, there's no denying it. Especially the car driving stuff is pretty much stolen from HL2. The demo gives the wrong impression about the game btw. It's the old PAX demo and they have clearly polished the game up a bit after that. There is also a shitload of little meaningless stuff you can do within the levels. You can play pinball, slots machines etc. A lot of interactive stuff to play around with.

And yes, you can pick up turds from a toilet bowl. :\

[Nick]

Yeah, Gearbox lied about giving us a brand new demo. I went back and watched some old PAX videos and it was clearly the exact same one.

[Zomboid]

My big collector's edition thing is waiting for me on Tuesday, but I won't be around to get it, so a buddy's picking it up for me.

[Zhukov]

Pfft. I'm getting a small plastic ocarina with MY pre-order of Zelda on 3DS.

[Nick]

I'm getting a bust of Duke Nukem, some gum, some pokerchips and some other crap.

[Mad Melvin]

I have the Balls Of Steel edition. It's purdy.

[Chojin]

http://www.i-mockery.com/chojin/dnf_halo.jpg

"Duke we've got your green power armor here and ready to go!"

"POWER ARMOR IS FOR PUSSIES."

http://www.i-mockery.com/chojin/dnf_popcorn.jpg

well, uh, okay

if i must



the loading screens are great:

http://www.i-mockery.com/chojin/dnf_bullets.jpg

http://www.i-mockery.com/chojin/dnf_turd.jpg

http://www.i-mockery.com/chojin/dnf_cheat.jpg

[Nick]

This game is fantastic. :(

[MattJack]

I've read a lot of reviews online and they are killing this game. They say it is a huge piece of shit.

I think that most reviewers are looking at it in the complete wrong way. Somehow, they wanted another CoD (yuck), BC2, or other realistic FPS. I always looked at this game as a DN3D 2.0 of sorts. It kind of seemed refreshing that they didn't put out another gritty, realistic modern war type feel game. Just seemed like a nod to the people who loved the game that came out more than a decade ago.

A few of my friends have it, but I won't be getting it until Steam presents it for 50% off.

How does everyone like it? Worth $60?

[Fathom Zero]

A lot of people have been calling it bad because it tries so hard to be Halo or CoD or Half Life 2 and ends up being far worse for it, since it can't hope to be as good as any of them. The two-weapon max and terrible jump and fetch puzzles are indicative of that.

[Mad Melvin]

Beat it last night. I really don't understand all the Duke hate the reviewsites are giving. This is a good game. Not a masterpiece by any means, but a fun, solid 3D shooter. The levels are great for the most part (didn't like the driving all that much), there are some good oneliners here and there and the shooting is satisfying. The two weapon limit is lame, but im guessing the modders will release a fix for that in no time.

In my opinion, DNF is the best 3D shooter I have played in years.

[Mockery]

Good game or not, it's probably just too hard to live up to all those years of hype and waiting. Even if the game made your computer shit gold nuggets, there would still be people with gripes about it.

That said, I haven't even played the game, so I can't say if I think it's any good or not yet.

[Supafly345]

What I am hearing from normal fans is that its just a needlessly bloated game. Long boring sequences of fluff, and not enough debauchery. I think you have to decide its a good game ahead of time, as from what I have been seeing from the reactions, those are the only people who like it.

I think it was just a last ditch effort to gain back a quarter of the money spent on it. I probably will never play it though.

[Chojin]

i think i'm almost through it

it's definitely a 90s FPS with all the puzzling, shitty level design, and lots of triggered events. it's an awful lot like half life 2, actually, and people cream their jeans over that game. i hate HL2 but i kinda like Duke. i recognize a lot of the scenes and animations from the asset dump 3drealms had after their company went under. i like that gearbox just finished the original game instead of making their own from scratch. Duke5 will likely be a gearbox original and score much higher.

i'd give it a 7.5 so far, but i'd much rather play this than COD 8765, Halo 4, Half life 3, or any other single player campaign shooter. I haven't tried multi yet and i'm sure that will only improve my opinion of the game. ultimately i'd say it's worth full price if you're at all fond of the series and have been waiting for this game. if you're some fag who was born long after duke3d game out and whose first FPS was halo, you should probably avoid it.

yes, the two-weapon system is gay and i don't really see what purpose it serves. unlike duke3d though, i don't feel like any single weapon is 'useless'--this makes the two-weapon system worse, though, since you don't know what you'll be fighting and can't bring the best loadout to each fight. trip mines and pipebombs as secondaries that you can toss at any time are great, and the game is really hard despite the recharging health system. i must have died over 20 times on the king octobrain fight, but when i finally got it i was fighting like a kung fu master; setting trip mines to catch the little guys, tossing pipes at the ones who lived, then exploding them before they could chuck them back, all while taking breaks to fire the devastator at the boss.

[kahljorn]

Even if the game made your computer shit gold nuggets, there would still be people with gripes about it.True, that would inflate the economy.

[Mad Melvin]

Oh lord, there must really be some sort of conspiracy going on regarding the reviews this game is getting. 1Up gave it an F, saying that every person who enjoys this game is a retarded mongoloid. Is it just me, or is everything in the internet black and white these days? Either a game is the most awesome thing ever, or the biggest piece of shit the world has ever smelled. Even if you hate the idea of Duke and think the humor is childish, the game mechanics and playability are still very well done. The low scores this game is getting should be reserved for the really bad games that are ugly, buggy as hell and impossible to play.

EDIT: Link to the review: http://www.1up.com/reviews/duke-nukem-forever-review

[Pentegarn]

Oh lord, there must really be some sort of conspiracy going on regarding the reviews this game is getting. 1Up gave it an F, saying that every person who enjoys this game is a retarded mongoloid.

1up stopped being interesting years ago, and arrogant opinions like that are why

[Chojin]

I just played some dukematch and had a lot of fun. Either the netcode or the server I was on was pretty gay though, as people would frequently teleport behind me after i'd been drilling them for a full 2-3 seconds and wondering why they weren't dead.

Mics are set to always-open if you have one, for some reason. The very first match I played I had some awful feedback so I turned voip volume off, but I later turned it back on to hear people giggling and moaning during the match. It was pretty neat.

Two of the deathmatch levels I played really stood out--they converted e1m1 from duke3d into a map, and the scene in duke burger when you're tiny is also in there. It reminded me a lot of SiN's deathmatch in the oddness of the proceedings, but things seemed to be decently balanced when lag wasn't dicking me over.

Duke also has tons of lines that you only hear in dukematch and he made me lol a few times. I don't recall him repeating any lines, either.

Re: melvin; I don't know what has some of these reviewers so emotionally-charged. It's pretty clear to me that none of them actually enjoyed Duke3D and are seeing the other negative reviews and trying to dogpile on the title.

Finishing the game unlocks a bunch of extra content, including all of the previous DNF trailers, a history of DNF in timeline format, pictures of the game throughout development, concept art, pictures of the offices, a soundboard, and a harder game mode that you have to play through again to get the 'real' ending.

http://www.i-mockery.com/chojin/dnf_custplayer.jpg

http://www.i-mockery.com/chojin/dnf_custapartment.jpg

http://www.i-mockery.com/chojin/dnf_soundboard.jpg

http://www.i-mockery.com/chojin/dnf_timeline.jpg

[MarioRPG]

I approve of chojins posts because he showed things that I hadn't seen 10 times. Timeline was a great idea.

[Chojin]

I'm playing through again on "damn i'm good" and the game is somehow getting better on the 2nd playthrough. Probably because I'm no longer stumbling around like an idiot trying to figure out where to go (OH HOW SILLY OF ME I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN TO KNOCK EVERY BOARD OFF THAT MINE ENTRANCE AND GO INSIDE BECAUSE I NEED GASOLINE THAT MAKES PERFECT SENSE) and because most enemies can kill you instantly, so I'm beginning to get conditioned into a badass the same way ninja gaiden trained me in the arts of fujitsu.

meanwhile, ign gave duke a 5.5. here's another game they gave a 5.5:

http://wiimedia.ign.com/wii/image/object/142/14256561/sb_nt_globs.wiiboxart_160w.jpg

eat a dick, game review industry

[Chojin]

something i noticed on the first playthrough: the general says about halfway through that the president says you shot at the aliens first, but that he's sure that's bullshit. on the second playthrough: while it's true that you do get assaulted on foot first, when you fight the mothership in your turret, it doesn't do anything until you fire the first shot. DUKE NUKEM THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT.

[dextire]

If nothing else, this game has caused the most entertaining reviews I've read in years. :lol
My two favorites so far:

Ars Technica (http://arstechnica.com/gaming/reviews/2011/06/duke-nukem-forever-review-barely-playable-unfunny-and-rampantly-offensive.ars/) - This is the best (in terms of entertainment) review I've read since back in the days of gaming magazines.
It's like a twelve-year-old boy was tricked into buying a empty box by a con-artist. And then the boy proceeds to beat the con-artist to death with that same empty box. :lol

PC Gamer (http://www.pcgamer.com/2011/06/10/duke-nukem-forever-review/) - This one is almost kind of sad. The reviewer goes on and on about all the problems with the game (too many puzzles, out of date graphics, etc.) that seems to describe a typical shooter that's worth a rating of 5, maybe 6 at most, and then he gives it an 8!

I'll be picking it up in the next week or two. Is it worth it to get the "Balls of Steel" edition?

[Nick]

I didn't regret picking up the Balls of Steel edition at all.

[Chojin]

what is the balls of steel edition? i got it on steam

[Mad Melvin]

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.joystiq.com/media/2011/02/dnf-balls-of-steel-na-530w.jpg

The magic of Google.

[Nick]

The book and comics were real fun to read.

[Mad Melvin]

Yeah, I really liked the comic. Gave me a chuckle or two and a craving for beer.

[Nick]

I think I'll start picking up the new comic series.

[Chojin]

there's a part on the level "crash course" where you have to man a stationary gun/turret and shoot down a bunch of ships. it is literally impossible on the hardest difficulty if you play it normally because most of the shots don't land and the gun overheats too quickly to kill everyone.

to beat it, you have to first turn on 'aim assist' in the options for the section. then, i had to macro something that did 100 mouse clicks per second. it slightly lowers the firing rate of the gun, but dramatically lowers the amount of heat it uses.

[Chojin]

now that i've played through it twice and done a decent amount of multi, here's some more input.

re: multiplayer stuff; as mentioned before, your mic is on by default if you have one connect, but there is no option to turn it off. what the fuck were they thinking?

i also only get about 6 or 7 servers in the list when i browse, and some of them suffer from really bad rubberbanding. also i'm kinda disappointed that everyone gibs when they die since i love ragdoll, and it just feels wrong when you splatter someone with a pistol. the devastator feels kinda OP, but then again most of the weapons kill in one shot anyway. the one map everyone wants to play is Hollywood Holocaust (e1m1 from duke3d), but it has the worst spawn points i've seen since goldeneye 64. often you'll spawn right in the middle of a room. you do have 2 seconds of invincibility, but you'll also usually spawn right next to where you just died so the dude with the devastator gets 2 or 3 kills from you if you spawn as quickly as possible. i guess that's why you're allowed to wait to respawn.

'capture the babe' is kinda fun but feels like it would be impossible against a decent team. when you pick the women up, they wave their hands in your face and you have to press action to spank them to make them stop. you also get limited to a magnum, but it's super-powered and can kill anyone in one shot--frankly, i'd rather be able to use that gun regularly.

i beat the game again on the hardest difficulty and the ending didn't change, which was bizarre to me since the ending is about 10 seconds long and really seems like a 'try again' ending.

there's some stuff in the game that i think is really unique and neat. i love that you can see duke's body when you look down, i really like the effects when you get knocked over and have to pick yourself back up--seeing that much of your body in a first-person perspective lends a lot to feeling like you're really duke. however, duke is kinda a pussy and can be killed in a single lunge from a pigcop. it feels like he should be able to take a lot more damage, and the challenge from harder difficulties should be more/respawning enemies, not hemophilia. some of the single player maps border on brilliant, most are bland, some are quite bad.

the single player campaign is still better than most people give it credit for being, i feel. the multiplayer is a huge nostalgia rush that quickly ends when you notice just how poorly it was put together.

i'd say the game is about a 6.5 objectively, but a duke fan will probably feel like it's more of a 7.5 and want to pick it up.

[Pentegarn]

I was reading the ars technica review and I do have to point out that this reviewer seems to be talking out of both sides of his mouth. He lavishes praise on the original Duke Nukem where he drops one liners (which are almost all pop culture references) and then goes on to complain that when Duke says "pork chop sandwiches" it is "just a reference". So which is it, references are "flavor" or "just a reference"?

[Nick]

there's a part on the level "crash course" where you have to man a stationary gun/turret and shoot down a bunch of ships. it is literally impossible on the hardest difficulty if you play it normally because most of the shots don't land and the gun overheats too quickly to kill everyone.

to beat it, you have to first turn on 'aim assist' in the options for the section. then, i had to macro something that did 100 mouse clicks per second. it slightly lowers the firing rate of the gun, but dramatically lowers the amount of heat it uses.

Those parts are super easy if you used the slow down option you unlock in the extra options menu. It doesn't count as cheating either.


Also I love that they included a Duke3d Freeze Ray option!

[Grislygus]

So. Don't know if you guys remember me wondering if I should buy a video game for the first time in, well, years. Fond memories of Duke Nukem 3d made this be the game I decided on.



This is, uh...








This is a game for creepy people. Which of you guys liked it?

[Pentegarn]

I haven't played it yet, but I do contend I am creepy so I will assume I do :lol

[Chojin]

This is a game for creepy people. Which of you guys liked it?

me. it kinda reminds me of the leisure suit larry games.

[Grislygus]

The first half was a fun and forgettable diversion like that, but then you realize in the second half that it's basically /B/TARD: THE GAME

[Chojin]

the second half of the game is mostly getting shrunk, driving, and shooting stuff

wut

[Grislygus]

The Hive. The hive at the end pretty much killed the whole thing for me completely.


Tickling ass doors, the room where you have to hear sobbing and puking women referencing the things that were done to them, walking up to your freshly raped girlfriends and telling them "looks like you're… fucked" right before they die horribly after begging you to save them because they promise to lose the weight gained from being horrible-alien-pregnant.

I know it's not that big a deal, being a sleazy game and all, but jesus


It's a shame, because I loved the beginning with the whole casino/museum/shark reef thing and was having a blast as of that point

[Grislygus]

and then now that I think about it, it seems like the reason they made the twins so goddamned annoying was specifically so that you wouldn't feel too bad about it. Like I said, not a big deal, but holy shit every single person who worked on this section probably stares at girls in parks while wearing trenchcoats


On the other hand, I don't really know why it's being talked about like it's the worst game ever, and I certainly don't get the TERRIBLE GRAPHICS BUGGY TERRIBLE GODAWFUL GRAPHICS comments. Then again, this is the first game I've played in a while

[Fathom Zero]

I've been hearing that a lot about that section, actually.

[Grislygus]

wtf there was a new thread I DIDN'T KNOW I WS A DAY LATE AND A DOLLAR SHORT. IGNORE ME

[Chojin]

the hive is like level 3, that isn't halfway through

on the one hand i agree that the hive is the worst level in the game. on the other, it's completely appropriate with the setting and duke. duke3d had the same women in tentacle cages who would moan "kill me" when you talked to them.

[Pentegarn]

That's just it.

People bitch and complain how much more raunchy and juvenile this one is, but the only reason the first one was less so was they had severe limits with what the graphics could do back then. Had they had then what they have now, it would have been just as raunchy and juvenile.

[Phoenix Gamma]

When I was in college, I took a course called "Sociology of Deviance". Basically, it was a course about weird people who did weird things, like extreme body modification, polygamists, chubby chasers, BDSM fetishists, drug users, etc. Basically explaining what they do, why we think they're weird, and why they get off on whatever they get off on. It was really interesting because by the end of the week you'd kinda understand where these people were coming from.

I mention this because I will never understand the appeal of tentacle rape. I haven't actually booted up the game yet because of work and shit, but I watched Giant Bomb's Quick Look, and goddamn The Hive made me feel really, really uncomfortable. I'm fine with the rest of the lazy humor, but that whole level looks like it would probably depress me :V

[Chojin]

goddamn The Hive made me feel really, really uncomfortable. I'm fine with the rest of the lazy humor, but that whole level looks like it would probably depress me :V

i think that in any other game, it would be seen as a powerful moment that challenges the player in some profound moral way. in a comedy game, it's like if there was an explicit rape scene in the middle of a naked gun movie. i thought the harvested women in duke3d were creepy and unnecessary too.

[Nick]

The Hive was one part of the game that I didn't care for either. It's just weird because you feel bad that the aliens are doing this to the women, and it makes you want to stop it from happening. Then you remember you're playing a Duke Nukem game and didn't expect it to be making you feel this uncomfortable, or anything for that matter. Why you gotta sneak emotions all up in my raunchy humor game, Duke?



I'm really not sure where 3DRealms was going with this part at all. Why did they think we would want to suddenly be faced with all these kidnapped women screaming and crying for their parents as aliens gestate inside of them? The joke that Duke tells the Twins was also in really poor taste, even for Duke. He always seemed to have an air of gruff remorse about the women he can't rescue, just like when he says he couldn't save them after you kill one of them, so having him say this to someone you thought he at least tolerated seemed very out of character for him. :L

[Dr. Boogie]

Played through DNF in a single evening. Took me just under 6 hours (about an hour of that spent watching loading screens), and I almost wish it was shorter. Pretty much everything in the game has been done better elsewhere and earlier. It's like they just took elements from all the big titles and slapped them together, hoping the combination would be something people would like.

Also, the Hive level was a huge tonal shift that didn't work at all for the game. I get what they were trying to do, namely recreate that feeling from episode 2 of Duke3D where you go into space and discover the alien's diabolical plans, but that only worked because they kept everything very minimalist. The captured women would just say, "kill me" if you tried talking to them. No weeping, no retching, no crying out for their parents, just you gawking at the horrible sight.

And part of it didn't even make sense:

When the Holsom twins first get kidnapped, Duke sounded legitimately angry, yet when he finds them in the hive, all he can do is make a snarky remark at how they're "fucked". Then you go slap some wall titties like nothing happened.

I went for the Balls of Steel Edition, and in the art book, Randy Pitchford said the entire game was the work of 3D Realms, with Gearbox just cleaning it up for shipping. If that's true, I can only hope the next Duke Nukem game is entirely the work of people outside of 3D Realms because they have nothing but terrible ideas.

[Nick]

You just now noticed they have horrible ideas? At what point did the 12 year development not make you notice this? :p

[Dr. Boogie]

It's not news to me, dick. I'm just remarking on how the finished product looks.

[Zomboid]

Well, this is pretty fun, but there are some pretty obvious flaws. Sometimes, when I'm looking at a poster or something, it's really grainy and I don't know if that's just the shitty graphics or a clever, annoying nod to the way Duke3D looked.

[Nick]

The only posters they bothered to make readable are the ones with tits in them.

[Chojin]

to everyone who is complaining about load times:

why the fuck are you playing an fps on a console

[Dr. Boogie]

I was still seeing substantial load times on my PC, and I'm not sure why. It's not as if it were loading a lot of complex textures.

[Nick]

The load times on my pc version were less than a minute.

[MattJack]

to everyone who is complaining about load times:

why the fuck are you playing an fps on a console

http://assets0.ordienetworks.com/images/GifGuide/clapping/citizen_cane.gif

[Zomboid]

I think I'm almost done. I'm blowing up the dam and just killed a giant eel. It's definitely an enjoyable game and a really nice throwback to old FPS games and Duke Nukem in particular. I can see why some people would bitch, but really, they should just blow it out their asses.

I play FPS games on a console because I don't even have a PC anymore. I use my laptop for school and everything else, I have no desire to play any games on it, and going off to get a PC just for gaming isn't worth the time or money.

[Nick]

Zomboid is always online. Always.

[Zomboid]

This week, yeah. There was a gap of about two months where I wasn't, though. I've gotta make up for lost time.

[Chojin]

I was still seeing substantial load times on my PC, and I'm not sure why. It's not as if it were loading a lot of complex textures.

i loaded each level in about 6 seconds at first, then ~3 seconds when dying

are you trying to play this on your mom's gateway

[Dr. Boogie]

3ghz with 2gb of RAM. I thought I was doing okay with it.

It never occurred to me that meeting the recommended settings for running the game would work out so badly for me.


Anyway, the Steam forums have people saying you can fix the load times by changing the priorities for Steam and DNF in Task Manager.

[Fathom Zero]

That's exactly what I have, Boog. I remember playing the demo that came out on Steam recently and it loaded in about 30 seconds or so.

The content of the demo, though, was enough to make me never want to buy the game. :lol Not that I was particularly interested in the first place.

[Zomboid]

PRETENTIOUS SHIT! >:

[Dr. Boogie]

What I would really like is for someone to make a mod that lets you collect all the weapons at once a la DN3D and modern games like Serious Sam. That takes care of one of the big critic complaints right there.

[Fathom Zero]

Fuck yeh, Serious Sam. I'm hyped for the next one, so much more than I ever cared about Duke Nukem.

[Nick]

Serious Sam 3 is just going to be Serious Sam 2 which was just Serious Sam 1.

[Fathom Zero]

That's good, because there was nothing wrong with any of those.

[Nick]

Nothing wrong with them, but I've already play them.

[Fathom Zero]

Well then you can not play it while I enjoy the co-op with fifteen other people and we can circle-strafe because we want to, not because it's part of a game that's desperately trying to be relevant.

[10,000 Volt Ghost]

3ghz with 2gb of RAM. I thought I was doing okay with it.

It never occurred to me that meeting the recommended settings for running the game would work out so badly for me.


Anyway, the Steam forums have people saying you can fix the load times by changing the priorities for Steam and DNF in Task Manager.

You need to have your pc do more cardio or have better form. I've seen chojins computer doing dead lifts just to prepare for the next fps.

[Nick]

I hate the arena rooms in the Serious Sam games. LESS ARENA ROOMS PLEASE.

[eggyolk]

I'm just gonna go ahead and revive this thread and throw my two cents in.

The game isn't bad, in my opinion atleast. Over hyped? Ofcourse. It's something that many people have been looking forward to for years, including myself (since age 13) and it didn't live up to their expectations. As for me, well, I'm enjoying it.

Then again... I got to the swimming bit where you blow the dam walls, and decided to give it a rest for a while. :lol