Everyone has some fond memories of Duke Nukem, whether it be during his early PC outings or his most famous adventure on the N64. Those who don’t have fond memories are the poor bastards that got stuck playing Duke Nukem Forever, where Duke should have been put out to pasture. Duke in his prime had some great adventures. I remember sitting around my buddies dorm, N64 plugged into the tubed television, and watching Duke blow away aliens while reciting one-liner after one-liner. Nostalgia has marred the lenses that most people see Duke Nukem Forever through, myself included. I was smart about my purchase of this game though; I waited until the price dropped then with a Surge in hand, I popped it into my Xbox 360.
I was nervous when I started this puppy up; years and years of developmental hell can ruin anything, but so can expectations. Poor Duke got his teeth kicked in by both of these, but he’s not alone; Episode 1 also felt the wrath of high expectations and a huge time gap. Now, I did enjoy my time with this game; the world needs more humor as far as I’m concerned and Duke spouting off helps a lot. There was just so much wrong with the game that Gearbox could have fixed before releasing the title. I know they were on a Borderlands high and felt they could do no wrong, but listening to a few gamers would have helped them out a bit.
The graphics weren’t that bad; I watched the opening cut-scene and when it panned onto Duke, I wondered to myself if he was made of plastic. Somehow the texture they put onto him makes him look like an unused Stretch Armstrong doll. Maybe they were going for greased up body-building like The Rock, but the tech in the engine just wasn’t good enough. The voice-acting however was perfection in a microphone. John St. John reprises his role as the lead character and leaves nothing on the table; if anyone in the development cared about this title it was John for sure. His jokes however could have been better; dated jokes can kill anything and they killed Duke. The biggest dated joke that made me groan was the armor joke ragging on Master Chief; I didn’t laugh, I just looked around and made sure no one else heard that schlock. Most of the jokes are written for a 12-year-old; they are dick and fart jokes that completely made me giggle.
The controls didn’t phase me at all, I did not die worthless deaths because Gearbox made sloppy controls. What did aggravate the hell out of me was the fact there is no HUD or map for me to rely on. The lack of maps in the game did not bother me until I arrived in a cavern that looked the same everywhere. What made that cavern even more confusing was the fact that the enemies would spit at me, or shoot goo at me and once it got on your face, your vision was impaired. I kept getting lost and dying until I finally aggro’d and killed everything in the cavern. Once that was done, I found some landmarks and trudged my way out of the darkness.
Changes in first-person shooters was another nail in Duke’s lofty coffin. Since Duke Nukem 64 had been released, gamers had been subject to some of the best FPS’s ever: Halo, Call of Duty, Battlefield and so on. Duke stayed in the 90’s with his style and his old tropes. If Gearbox pulled him into the 21st Century and made jokes about that in-game, maybe Duke could have been saved. I’m beginning to wonder what Gearbox is going to do with this classic character. Are they going to give him one more go in a AAA title, will they make him a downloadable character for Battleborn, or will he find his way into Borderlands 3? Randy Pitchford is the man to ask, but since he’s a certified magician, he may have just made Duke disappear from gaming forever.
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