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Duke Nukem Forever Drifts To 2005?

Posted by simoniker on from the followed-by-cavalcade-of-jokes dept.

Thanks to GameSpot for their story discussing remarks made during today's Take Two financial conference call regarding Duke Nukem Forever's release date. Take Two CEO Jeffrey Lapin indicated that he "...had a recent conversation with [Duke Nukem Forever's] developer, and they expect the game to be completed sometime at the end of '04 or the beginning of '05." Naturally, the epic history of the game is then discussed, and the author points out: "Though Take Two spent a reported $12 million for the rights to publish Duke Nukem Forever, the game's development is being completely self-funded by 3D Realms, which still owns the franchise. The developer has never officially announced a release date, keeping with 3D head George Broussard's famous mantra that the release date is 'when it's done'."

7 of 93 comments (clear)

  1. It's either... by Andy+Smith · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ... an overly-obsessive commitment to quality or it's sheer wanton incompetence.

    Either way, the trouble with DNF's bloated development time is that it can now never be good enough. The longer people wait (under the promise of "we'll release it when it's perfect") the higher their expectations will be. Games, films, albums, etc have an upper limit to how good they can be. People's expectations can go much, much higher. I fear that 3DR are setting themselves up to have a turkey with this game, irrespective of how good it actually is.

    I wonder if a possible film tie-in has anything to do with DNF's delays? If there's a film in the works then it would help both the film and the game if they come out at around the same time. Maybe the game's delays are due to the (unannounced and purely speculative) film's delays? Considering the antiquity of the game's engine and the outdated character, I'm sure 3DR would appreciate the guaranteed mass-market sales that a big summer action movie tie-in could generate.

    1. Re:It's either... by Firehawke · · Score: 4, Insightful

      They've changed engines two or three times now, which is a sure sign of problems-- without going through a huge redesign session, they'd be working with specs geared to an older engine. Sure, you can up the polycount and detail, but there are things inherent to the engine itself that probably won't have been taken into account in the upgrade.

      I expect the game won't be all it's been hyped to be, but then, that's a given considering how long this has been hyped. Even Max Payne finally made it to release. DNF.. is going to be THE legend in terms of either vaporware or turkey software depending on if they EVER release it.

  2. Re:Running Gag by forged · · Score: 3, Insightful
    Check out the date on that PA strip from over 4 years ago !

    DNF jokes are so passe, they're just not funny anymore...

  3. game development by ghettoreb · · Score: 5, Insightful

    when your game comes out later than Longhorn, you know you've been taking too long

    Doom3, Half-Life2, now DNF are three games that have either taken a *long* time to get to market or have ran over timelines. It seems like it would make sense for any future large-scale game development project to hire more developers than they would in the past, because as these upcoming games show all too clear: game development is unpredictable and time-consuming.

  4. Re:Apt Title by Torgo's+Pizza · · Score: 3, Insightful
    I understand your frustration about Black Isle, but... what the hell are you talking about? Take Two and Interplay are two very, very different publishers. And what money are you talking about? The money that 3DRealms is putting into their own game? I'm assuming the $12 million publishing rights that Take Two paid. That kind of money doesn't go as far as it used to. That might buy you one or two titles tops, but Interplay has financial woes much larger than that.

    You may not like it, but it's 3DRealms money and they can do with it however they want. The fact that they still have money to still develop this title is amazing.

  5. Still wouldn't mind DNF by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    DNF might have had a decent chance had it shown at E3 and Half-Life 2 not been announced a week before.

    There still hasn't been an FPS that matches the comedy, personality, and interactivity (comparitively speaking) of Duke Nukem 3d. There really weren't any good Duke 3d clones that rivaled it in terms of personality that weren't create using the same engine. Both Blood and Shadow Warrior used about the same tech as Duke 3d, and I can't think of a decent character-based fps that's come out since.

    Now, DNF will probably be released, and most likely using one of the latest versions of the "Unreal Warfare" engine, which appears to be highly modifiable. I'm not holding my breath for DNF to come out, but I can still honestly say that I'd love to play a modern (or even semi modern) FPS with the personality and attitude ("I'm gonna rip off your head and $#1t down your neck!" - that cutscene is just classic) of Duke 3d, and I still think it has a market.

    Of course, the release of Half-life 2 and DOOM 3 might make it a moot point, but Duke has a totally different feel than both of those games and could still co-exist if it ever gets released.

  6. Re:3DR and DNF by The+Evil+Couch · · Score: 2, Insightful
    3DR is spending all of their own cash (yes kids, Duke Nukem is a profitable franchise!)

    I'm pretty sure that Duke Nukem isn't responsible for even half of their current income. Max Payne and Max Payne 2 are probably more responsible for 3D Realms current cash flow.

    If 3D Realms is looking to create the perfect game, they truely will be at it forever, because no one game is going to blow everyone away and make them lose touch of reality, just to get "one more minute" of game time.

    They've changed engines 3 times, which is a sign that they're struggling to keep up with technology, but don't know how. The Quake 3 engine, which was made in 1999 is STILL being used in games today and it still looks good. No, the reason why they're not releasing anything is more likely because they don't want to embaress themselves. Even if they're on the razor's edge of technology, so is id, bungie and sierra. The best they could hope for is to tie with one of them and tying just isn't good enough to win people over.

    The only way 3DR is going to be able to sell DNF is with Duke's attitude and fun-factor and the code has next to nothing to do with either of those.

    Someone's screwing up the DNF team or the DNF team itself is screwed up.

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