Over-hated Games

[Turbo Kid]

You do NOT understand Duke. Duke as a character isn't "edgy f-bombs, sex jokes and unironic testosterone", he is the insane man in a straight-laced world: Ever since Duke 1, he was designed as an explicit parody of macho action heroes, and indeed, if you were to play 3D, you'd realise that Forever missed the point, not just of who Duke is, but of what Duke as a franchise is meant to be.

In 1, 2, 3D, and the spin-offs, most of the jokes were built around either loving homages and nods to the films that inspired the Duke, such as the 3D level "Pigsty" opening up with Duke saying "I'll be back!" as a car rams into a police station, or absurd nods to the culture of the times, such as a billboard in Manhattan Project advertising a show called "I Married a TR**NY!", spoofing shameless, exploitative reality TV from the 2000s, or the entire bit involving the "society for preparation of the canine hamburger" in 3D. And whenever the jokes DID delve into sexual material, it was usually a lot more tasteful and subtle as opposed to what we get in Forever.
Duke Nukem Forever on the other hand ditches any form of tact, art or taste in favour of being a mean-spirited, spiteful parody of modern gaming where most of the humour comes from people being assholes, Duke being treated as the greatest thing in the world, and obsession with the act of placing the penis in the rectum. The "signature of Duke" is NOT there, and if it is, it's been perverted beyond all recognition.
In fact, saying that Forever is just like the original games is WHY Forever killed the series, why the franchise has attracted a slew of anti-SJW douchebags, and why shitmeister Adi Shankar is now going to finish what Forever started and kill the Duke once and for all: Critics of the time (and even today) say that the game is just like the older entries because they had no interest in said entries, and this resulted in casual gamers wanting nothing to do with Duke Nukem as an IP. So yeah. You are wrong on so many levels.

(And don't even compare this to the Star Wars Prequels; those movies are different from the originals, but they still understood the core of Star Wars and are honestly really good. Unlike Duke Nukem Forever.)

 

[Neb Lleb]

Figures a fellow Duke Nukem Forever defender would use a Last Jedi clip. You know what? I'm just gonna leave this video here to show you how wrong you are:

 

[snes9x]

Duke Nukem Forever

It has its flaws like long loading screens and some modern decision like carrying 2 guns (That, imho is not even bad). I would even dare to say that is helped to stay FPS away from the CoD/scripted all present formula and put FPS on a classic design but on modern systems, what will be (badly imo) called "boomer shooter" later. The level design where great and some jokes where fun.

But the gaming media decided they where too enlighten to hear dirty jokes from a character that was known for dirty jokes. so they trashed the game and it become the "cool" thing to do.

the game is really good. I highly recommend it.

Nah, DNF is a tonally confused mess that wants to have its cake and eat it too (ie, framing itself as a badass "boomer" shooter while using the same conventions as the modern shooters it so desperately wants to put itself above.) I don't care about the revisionist culture war shit. It's a bad game.

 

[Neb Lleb]

Nah, DNF is a tonally confused mess that wants to have its cake and eat it too (ie, framing itself as a badass "boomer" shooter while using the same conventions as the modern shooters it so desperately wants to put itself above.) I don't care about the revisionist culture war shit. It's a bad game.

Accurate. Don't even get me started on how spiteful it is with its attempts at "parody" in contrast to more loving and affectionate spoofs featured in Duke titles like 3D, Time To Kill and Manhattan Project.

 

[Graves Ruinwalker]

You do NOT understand Duke. Duke as a character isn't "edgy f-bombs, sex jokes and unironic testosterone", he is the insane man in a straight-laced world: Ever since Duke 1, he was designed as an explicit parody of macho action heroes, and indeed, if you were to play 3D, you'd realise that Forever missed the point, not just of who Duke is, but of what Duke as a franchise is meant to be.

In 1, 2, 3D, and the spin-offs, most of the jokes were built around either loving homages and nods to the films that inspired the Duke, such as the 3D level "Pigsty" opening up with Duke saying "I'll be back!" as a car rams into a police station, or absurd nods to the culture of the times, such as a billboard in Manhattan Project advertising a show called "I Married a TR**NY!", spoofing shameless, exploitative reality TV from the 2000s, or the entire bit involving the "society for preparation of the canine hamburger" in 3D. And whenever the jokes DID delve into sexual material, it was usually a lot more tasteful and subtle as opposed to what we get in Forever.
Duke Nukem Forever on the other hand ditches any form of tact, art or taste in favour of being a mean-spirited, spiteful parody of modern gaming where most of the humour comes from people being assholes, Duke being treated as the greatest thing in the world, and obsession with the act of placing the penis in the rectum. The "signature of Duke" is NOT there, and if it is, it's been perverted beyond all recognition.
In fact, saying that Forever is just like the original games is WHY Forever killed the series, why the franchise has attracted a slew of anti-SJW douchebags, and why shitmeister Adi Shankar is now going to finish what Forever started and kill the Duke once and for all: Critics of the time (and even today) say that the game is just like the older entries because they had no interest in said entries, and this resulted in casual gamers wanting nothing to do with Duke Nukem as an IP. So yeah. You are wrong on so many levels.

(And don't even compare this to the Star Wars Prequels; those movies are different from the originals, but they still understood the core of Star Wars and are honestly really good. Unlike Duke Nukem Forever.)

I agree only partially with you . Forever in the 2000s would be a huge hit but the game we actually got was CoD-slop with an attempt to be like Duke Nukem but with the worst sin they did , was to make a story about him to make him "deeper" which doesnt work and the game had unnecessary moments of stay and wait scripts and gameplay-brakes that wasnt there in the older games and neuters the immensly . Duke Nukem is a superficial badass and not a deep character . The games were always about the gameplay first and the "story" is just set-pieces for the levels and boss-fights that underline the gameplay of it .

I dont like the official Forever because it was extremly linear and the story was utter garbage that never was needed . The CoD gameplay ruined any replayability whatsoever and i only agree that the jokes were very tasteless and not cool in the slightest .

What we saw in the 2000 leaked version of Forever was way much cooler and had such huge potential to be one of the best games ever made but George Bussard didnt stop with his ever increasing ambition and ruined the development in the worst way possible .

Nothing against the people that like the official Forever but they didnt knew what they actually missed out with the 2000s version of the game and so did i till the leak came out . And it was the only Duke Nukem game that got output way later and most people lost the actual point of Duke Nukem . Nothing to blame there just the blind ambition of the developers and Randy Pitchford for taking the mantle when he even lost the point why Duke Nukem was beloved from the beginning .

Playing an 80s action hero with an gameplay that allows to embody their own badassery in all its interactivity , mechanics and level design was the actual mainpoint of the Duke Nukem-games . But the official product was the Anti-approach to it and it failed hard to be an actual timeless classic like DN3D .

 

[BigTony]

Gex nowadays its only know as the punchline to a joke but it was one of my favorites as a kid and i still think they hold up pretty well.

 

[Juiceala]

Gex nowadays its only know as the punchline to a joke but it was one of my favorites as a kid and i still think they hold up pretty well.

I think the general opinion turned around now but I agree, Gex is a lot better than people used to say, it plays nice and the level design is quite hood, also I like how you get booted out of the level upon completing it like Mario 64, it gives a sense of completion, I hate games like DK 64 and Mario Odyssey where they feel like a chore.

 

[King Torro]

- Adult jokes? check, all the way
- Duke silliness? from the "balls box" to the level where you go small on a burger tower
- Reference to other popular IP? Check as well, even giving some hits at Halo and Dead Space (for example)

It will definitely didnt live to the expectations of like 14 years (and like 3 development resets), but saying it has nothing to do us just ridiculous. It feel like a Duke Nukem 3D successor, maybe not the best sequel and it clearly has its flaws, but it fits right there. The "fans" and many other just hated it because it was the popular thing to do back then. Like the Star Wars prequels.

I agree with you largely. I think that the gameplay with the "modern fps" movement and tight gun limit was bad, and the game had severe pacing issues, like the parts where you're wandering around the desert or the innards of the Hoover Damn for way too long because there is very little for Duke to quip about or interact with. Duke Nukem is at it's best when it has Duke making one-liners or corny jokes or presenting references or cheeky situations at the player (like the section when Duke is shrunk and the lady is contemplating possibilities regarding shrunk Duke.

For all it's flaws DNF still has a lot of that Duke charm, and it gives you segments that provide a break from the core gameplay like the wrecking ball (sadly too early then for a Miley Cyrus reference), the forklift sections (if only you could properly lift pallets with the forklift!), a lot of interaction in the strip club, the platforming while shrunken at Duke Burger the RC car sequences. I wish they had

Spoiler: plot / character spoilers

kept the Folsom twins around longer to provide Duke with motivation

but overall the game was decent, even good at the beginning and middle parts before the slog of the desert + dam endgame.
The DLC (Doctor Who Cloned Me) was actually really good as far as the pacing of all the quirky fun parts of Duke Nukem Forever goes, but unfortunately and unsurprisingly the flaws of the basic gameplay are there.

I don't think that Duke Nukem Forever is some kind of a masterpiece, far from it, but considering that so much of the Duke Nukem franchise is bad butchered ports of Duke 3d or thoroughly mediocre stuff like Land of the Babes, in my personal opinion Duke Nukem Forever sits in the upper mid parts of the Duke Nukem pyramid imho. Or at least doesn't deserve to as much of the scorn it receives.

Obviously everyone has their own preferences and rankings of all these various games so not belittling anyone's opinion but I think that as you said / implied in your other post, people have built up an image of Duke Nukem that is somehow more noble / complex / artistically sound than what he actually is. I love Civvie11's vids and he often has sound opinions to go with his comedy, but I think he also did this thing where he elevated Duke in non-Forever games to make the Forever-Duke seem worse by comparison.

"Duke Nukem is your 80s-90s action man hero: he kick asses, he gets the girls and he eat burgers"

Couldn't agree more.

 

[evercaptor]

Any other Devil May Cry 2 apologists out there? The tone was different to 1, but It's no worse playing in my opinion. I also really appreeciated there being a female main character to play (requiring a playthrough to unlock the next difficulty level, even!) Except for 3 and four, I think Devil may cry got better each entry, dMc -Devil May Cry- included. That was a fabulous game to play.

 

[Neb Lleb]

I agree with you largely. I think that the gameplay with the "modern fps" movement and tight gun limit was bad, and the game had severe pacing issues, like the parts where you're wandering around the desert or the innards of the Hoover Damn for way too long because there is very little for Duke to quip about or interact with. Duke Nukem is at it's best when it has Duke making one-liners or corny jokes or presenting references or cheeky situations at the player (like the section when Duke is shrunk and the lady is contemplating possibilities regarding shrunk Duke.

For all it's flaws DNF still has a lot of that Duke charm, and it gives you segments that provide a break from the core gameplay like the wrecking ball (sadly too early then for a Miley Cyrus reference), the forklift sections (if only you could properly lift pallets with the forklift!), a lot of interaction in the strip club, the platforming while shrunken at Duke Burger the RC car sequences. I wish they had

Spoiler: plot / character spoilers

kept the Folsom twins around longer to provide Duke with motivation

but overall the game was decent, even good at the beginning and middle parts before the slog of the desert + dam endgame.
The DLC (Doctor Who Cloned Me) was actually really good as far as the pacing of all the quirky fun parts of Duke Nukem Forever goes, but unfortunately and unsurprisingly the flaws of the basic gameplay are there.

I don't think that Duke Nukem Forever is some kind of a masterpiece, far from it, but considering that so much of the Duke Nukem franchise is bad butchered ports of Duke 3d or thoroughly mediocre stuff like Land of the Babes, in my personal opinion Duke Nukem Forever sits in the upper mid parts of the Duke Nukem pyramid imho. Or at least doesn't deserve to as much of the scorn it receives.

Obviously everyone has their own preferences and rankings of all these various games so not belittling anyone's opinion but I think that as you said / implied in your other post, people have built up an image of Duke Nukem that is somehow more noble / complex / artistically sound than what he actually is. I love Civvie11's vids and he often has sound opinions to go with his comedy, but I think he also did this thing where he elevated Duke in non-Forever games to make the Forever-Duke seem worse by comparison.



Couldn't agree more.

You cannot miss the point this hard.

 

[Juiceala]

 

[moonbits]

Chrono Cross

 

[Anoobis]

FF8. It's still my favorite, with only X as a possible challenger.