By Daniel Rutledge
Duke Nukem Forever has been in development since 1996, is a sequel to a much-loved predecessor and hence had a massive level of hype building towards its release. It’s fair to say expectations were high.
And sadly, it’s fair to say those expectations weren’t met.
There’s a whole lot about the game to not like – crappy level design, poor graphics, ropey shooter mechanics and some awfully tedious sections.
But then there are some things to enjoy too, especially if you were a fan of Duke Nukem 3D – there’s a lovably high level of crassness, tonnes of nostalgic joy and a fair few laughs.
Set about a decade after the events of Duke Nukem 3D, the lovably ultra-American action hero Duke is a mega-wealthy, famous playboy. The game opens in first-person view above a toilet where you have to urinate to continue. You can then play with faeces, draw something juvenile on a whiteboard, kill an alien boss by circle-strafing him for a few minutes and finally receive fellatio from two pretty young twins.
If this sounds like it won’t be fun, there is no point in you playing this game at all and you might as well stop reading this review right here. Those sort of gags, together with nostalgia, are the only reasons this game has any worth at all and if they don’t appeal to you, nothing else in Duke Nukem Forever will.
I should also point out that women are in this game solely for the purposes of sexual objectification, something that is sure to offend some people. In context, it’s clearly a joke, and I found it funny. But I do think it’s totally deserving of the R18 rating and was surprised at just how demeaning it got at points.
Of course if you enjoy that sort of humour and poorly rendered digital boobies, you’re going to love parts of Duke Nukem Forever. The developers take full advantage of being able to swear too, with some characters dropping F-bombs like it’s going out of fashion.
The game is chock full of references not only to the earlier Duke Nukem games, but also to other games and movies. This brings mixed results. It’s kind of funny how Duke is offered Halo star Master Chief’s armour suit at one point which he dismisses as being “for pussies”. It’s fairly unfunny when he references Starship Troopers at another point by randomly saying “I’m from LA and I say kill em all”.
The bulk of the game is obviously first-person shooter fare. It’s very similar to Duke Nukem 3D but with a few updated features, most noticeably the design of some bosses. Some of the bosses look fantastic. But everything else looks, and feels, like a previous-generation console title.
It’s hard to put into words just how different shooters are now to how they were when Duke Nukem was good, because there have been so many advancements made. Check some of these YouTube videos to see how Duke Nukem Forever looks and compare it to any other shooter released since around 2000. You won't feel how clunky the controls are, but you can see how crappy it looks.
A lot of the levels feature truly tedious sections that for me are the worst part of the game. If you are going to play Duke Nukem Forever, I pity you having to do the RC car bits. When Duke is shrunk and you have to drive the little RC car around a few levels, it’s incredibly boring. Having to move a Duke Nukem statue about in order to clumsily jump up and down it to get to a higher point is almost as bad. Driving around as a normal-size Duke in a normal-size car on a boring desert area level is painfully dull too. And then swimming section at the end is unbelievably dreary.
The thing about these segments is that not only are they not fun, they have no novelty value at all. Similar segments in games in the ‘90s were fun because we hadn’t played them before. Now if you want to play a racing game, you play an awesome one, ditto a platformer or a puzzle game. You don’t get little segments of those types of games inserted into Call of Duty or Battlefield. There are mini-games and multiple styles of gameplay in Rockstar titles, of course, but each has a fun or novelty value that Duke Nukem Forever just doesn’t. And pretty much any Rockstar title from Grand Theft Auto 3 on would wipe the floor with Duke Nukem Forever.
These tedious segments comprise a lot of the early game, when it should really be blowing you away with amazing cinematics or, I dunno, fun gameplay or something. Speaking of amazing cinematics, or even half-decent ones, there’s none on offer here. There’s no epic scenes at all, playable or not. It’s honestly like playing a ‘90s shooter in more ways than it should be for a full-priced game.
Another aspect that grated my nerves over and over again was the lengthy load times. I can’t speak for other formats as I’ve only played it on Xbox 360, but every time you die and go back to the last checkpoint, this load-screen comes up for around 40 seconds to a minute, even if you die straight away. It’s a long time to wait and seems totally unnecessary as it’s loading such a primitive looking level that is surely not pushing the memory capabilities of your machine. Hell, the 1996 game loaded faster on PC, and let you have multiple save files, which Duke Nukem Forever inexplicably doesn’t.
Playing multiplayer provided a few giggles, but ranges from fairly ho-hum to abysmal, despite a few fun weapons like railguns. The developers do a reasonable job of recreating ‘90s multiplayer shooters, but, that novelty is a short-lived joy, and downloadable games will give it to you for a lot cheaper. If you want a game where it feels comfortable and realistic firing a weapon at an online opponent, this is not the game for you. There is a capture-the-babe mode which is a funny variation on capture the flag. Once you’ve stolen the enemy team’s woman, she may try to distract you somehow, but you get her in line by giving her a spank on the bum. It’s funny, but after you’ve done it once, that funniness fades away and there is little of value in it. Basically, while it may give you a laugh, Duke Nukem Forever multiplayer is inferior to almost all other shooters on the market at the moment.
The shortcomings of Duke Nukem Forever were viewed much more harshly by two younger gamer friends I played with at two separate times, James and Dylan, who I’m sure would both be awarding one star if they reviewed it. I guess I’m more forgiving because I’m always going to get a kick out of a game that lets you pick up poos and fling it about the place, kick an alien’s head from its shoulders and receive a lap dance from a topless stripper. They’re cheap thrills, sure, but they bring the LOLz...
So all in all, Duke Nukem Forever is fun in places, but annoyingly bad in most. The fact that the game’s creators have had so many years to smooth over all the rough patches and get everything right just makes it all the more disappointing.
In reviewing the game I have to think of it versus others on the market competing for your hard-earned dollars. It doesn’t compare favourably.
Instead of buying the game, it might be a better option to pay for a download of Duke Nukem 3D from Xbox Live and just play that. Get the free demo version at least.
If you love crass jokes of poor taste, or if you liked the previous Duke Nukem games, I’d say the game is worth a look and you should maybe hire it out for a weekend and enjoy it with a couple of beers (seeing as you’re 18 or over to be playing it anyway, you’re old enough to be boozing too).
If you want a decent quality game in terms of gameplay, graphics, originality and most factors you judge a game on, steer clear of the Duke.
One and a half stars.
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Duke Nukem Forever
:: Publisher: 2K Games
:: Developer: Gearbox Software
:: Format: PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, PC
:: Rating: R18