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Duke Nukem Not Out In 2003, Manhunt, GTA, More..
Thanks to several readers for pointing out Take Two's financial results for Q2 2003, as the owner of the Rockstar, Gotham Games, and Gathering labels had a 58 percent increase in profit, largely due to Rockstar's massive Grand Theft Auto franchise and the new Midnight Club 2. The accompanying earnings conference call had a question about Duke Nukem Forever coming out in 2003, which the CEO answered: "for this holiday season.. no.. we're just hopeful that the team in Dallas will finish it." Also trailed was "a significant Xbox game" from Rockstar to release in Q1 2004 (GTA, anyone?), and that one of Gathering's (PC?) titles is using the Halo engine. Finally, there was another mention of Rockstar North's mysterious Manhunt - an even darker, more twisted game from the GTA developers?
When I skimmed the headline and missed the "not."
Wake me when Duke is coming now. Now that will be news!
"The dinosaurs died because they didn't have a space program." - Niven
according to SCO there are 1-2 lines of code that appear in Duke that they claim rights to. So until this is settled the game is on hold.
... And they are:
"int main() {"
and
"}"
-Sean
It's actually in the works. Has been, since, uh 1997 (almost six years so far, and counting!) The webpage is here.
The DNF team started work with the Quake I engine, dumped it for the Quake II engine, dumped it for the Unreal engine...not sure what they're working on now, but it better not be the Unreal engine (the original one; not UT or UT23k), as that'd be hideously ancient by now too.
Still no release date set. But we're assured that they're still working on it.
Unfortunately, the big selling point of Manhunt right now is that it's 'mysterious'. Gotta love stealth advertising? Or not. I saw one foreign website comparing the game to the movie 'The Fugitive', but I have no idea if that's right or not.
So there's still no screenshots and details, though the game has been on release lists since 2001. Rockstar launched GTA3 with a fair bit of stealth, though (probably because they wanted to get into stores before complaints about the content started!), which makes me hopeful.. we'll see.
I think they dumped all those engines for a V6, and are now headed out of town as quick as possible.
Never, ever lose a file again. Ever.
That's the problem with relying on other people's engines in long development cycles... When you have been in development since 1997, you either have to dump your engine repeatedly, or ship before you get stale with an under-polished game. Either way your engine will be behind the engine of your competition, whose last iteration will be competing with your next release... a tough act to follow for a AAA title.
Doom 3 has an excellent engine (judging by the leaked alphas), and HalfLife 2 will probably just rock too. For years to come games will be based upon these engines. Whatever the Duke kiddies have up their sleves, it had better be slick or else they are going to have a hard time competing with them.
Of course, after 6 years of active development and the somewhat unenthusiastic comments of those working on the project, I would be willing to wager this is one project stuck in the bad type of development hell, and whose eventual release will not be met with much acclaim.
Next big thing, please.
The ______ Agenda
I was working at 3dRealms when Duke Nukem Forever began development. I left the company in May of 1998. Before licensing the Quake 1 engine, Allen Blum and Dirk Jones had begun prototyping some things in a iterated version of BUILD - that stuff was pretty cool at the time. Prior to that, when Apogee was still working with external developers and the shareware model, there was even a Duke Nukem side scroller in development, being produced by Keith Schuller, it was brilliantly named: Duke Nukem 4-ever. In any case, I, like everyone else, is just waiting for official information. The last Duke Nukem 3d mission I designed at 3dRealms was called "Area 51" - it was the secret mission in the fourth Episode (Atomic Edition). Last I heard, Las Vegas and the business with aliens around Area 51 was central to the Duke Nukem Forever story. So, I'm probably a bit more curious than most to see what comes out. But, think about it for a moment... Since inevitable comparisons to Valve will be made - remember that HL2's "Source" is very likely Valve's eventual reconstruction and iteration of technology they once licensed from id Software. Given that 3dRealms certainly has to be doing something and given that they have been working on DNF with an Unreal engine since before Half-Life had shipped, they may be just as distant from their foundation as Valve is. Ok, back to Halo PC...
Blizzard - no one would complain, everyone would say they are just going to release it when they are ready
Hideo Kojima - it would come out, but you would play as one of the strippers
Apple - it would look really really cool, and somewhat feminine at the same time
Eidos - Duke would have big boobs
"There is no teacher but the enemy."-Mazer Rackham
GTA3 and VC don't have MP for a reason. Rockstar's net code just plain sucks. Ever played a GTA1/2 MP game with a ping over 100? The lag is pretty bad. They also have to deal with spawning cars, which is OK for only one person, but it gets complicated to make sure multiple people are all seeing the same cars in the same place. Because if Bob gets into a car that only exists on Bob's game, and is inexistent on Joe's game, that's not a good thing.
A very appropriate quote, from Donny in Gone in 60 Seconds (the black dude with the hat):
"Pull over. Pull it the hell over! Let's see, you can't negotiate traffic, you can't signal properly, you can't parallel park. Hell, you can't drive, honey. I can't swim, I know I can't. So you know what I do? I stay my black ass out the pool!"
Rockstar just plain sucks at MP code. So they don't do it. I'm not saying they gave up, I'm pretty sure they're trying, but do you really want buggy, laggy, messed-up, glitchy multiplayer games? I'd rather have a really good single player game.
Funny, in the racing world "DNF" means "Did Not Finish". Hmmm....