Slashdot Mirror
The Nuking of Duke Nukem
Rick Bentley writes with more on the story behind the meltdown of Duke Nukem Forever, the game that will now live on only as a cautionary tale: "Although the shutdown was previously reported on Slashdot, this new Wired article goes in-depth behind the scenes to paint a picture of a mushroom cloud-sized implosion. Developers spending a decade in a career holding pattern for below market salary with 'profit sharing' incentives, no real project deadlines, a motion capture room apparently used to capture the motion of strippers (the new game was to take place in a strip club, owned by Duke, that gets attacked by aliens), and countless crestfallen fans. *Sniff*, I would have played that game."
Using motion capture room for strippers is just badass.
Ah, memories from childhood. One day my friend told me he had found a kickass game from a BBS and asked if I wanted to go play it with him after school. He described it to me and I was already sold, but but... My mother Giovanna had told me to help my father at our family pizza place after school. Damn it!
School day became to end and I tried to consider my options, but there were none. I had to go help my papa make pizza. Frustraded, almost crying, I walked the streets of Naples back home. Every now and then I watched inside a window on the street and noticed someone playing on computer. I was thinking if that could be it, but I'd never know.
I decided to think for a moment. Like a good oven takes its time and peace to bake and finish a delicious pizza, my padre would wait for me. It was time to go see what the game was about.
And I was amazed. Great looking graphics, funny sounding man that I did not understand and girls with something on their chest that looked like doughnuts with a salami on top of it. It was truly marvelous.
While later serving customers at my fathers pizza place, I couldn't but think that I have to get a computer and this Duke Nukem 3D game. I mean, I loved baking pizza. But there is a time when a boy must choose between leisure and girls. But my father never got me a computer.
Like an overbaked pizza, my dreams were crushed when Duke Nukem Forever never came.
Developers spending a decade in a career holding pattern for below market salary with 'profit sharing' incentives, no real project deadlines, a motion capture room apparently used to capture the motion of strippers
Really, that's just too easy. Can't you at least make it a challenge to get +5 Funny???
Oh well, here goes... Sounds like my job, but without the strippers.
Now the game is cancelled, can they at least release the data from the motion-captured strippers ?
Developers spending a decade in a career holding pattern for below market salary with 'profit sharing' incentives, no real project deadlines, a motion capture room apparently used to capture the motion of strippers.
I'd work for below market salary just to be able to work with no deadlines, let alone the free strippers in the office. :-)
Interesting note in the article also was
Normally, game developers don’t have much cash. Like rock bands seeking a label to help pay for the cost of recording an album, game developers usually find a publisher to give them an advance in exchange for a big slice of the profits.
Since people usually complain about music labels being evil, would game developers survive without publishers that pay their costs? Sure, indie's do, but look at what happened to 3D Realms too, and they even financed lots from their own past revenues.
I knew I shouldn't have pre-ordered back in 1999.
And I'm all out of money.
They never released it because the opposition kept getting better? If they could retain the great humour that went into the Duke3D, they would not need the latest and greatest in 3D gaming. It should stand alone.
Duke Nukem 3D was pretty average technically, but who cares when it is so funny and engaging. The saga of Duke Nukem Forever reminds me of how George Lucas discovered CGI, but forgot script writing. Just because something is pretty doesn't mean to say that it is good.
Free/open-source software has a lot of these. As an open-source developer myself, I can understand why. One issue is that a lot of open-source projects are started by young naive people who do not realize how much time and effort it really takes to make a software program. Probably over half of the projects on Sourceforge fall under this category. One example is MooDNS, a DNS server that stopped development around the time the developer realized what a pain in the butt DNS compression is.
Another way open-source projects get abandoned is when other software that does the same thing comes along. For example, the GNU Hurd never became production-ready because Linux came along and was good enough that the perceived need for Hurd development went away.
Other projects that stop development are projects where the developers stop going to school and get real jobs, and no longer have time to devote to an open-source project. One example of this is the Y Window System
For all of the advantages of Free software, one issue is that, without, by and large, the developers being paid money, there is not nearly as much motivation to get something finished, so a lot of projects become vaporware.
Closer to home, I've told myself for years I would have a thread-free version of a recursive resolver for my own MaraDNS. I finally started writing the code in late 2007. Around the end of 2007, I had a working basic non-recursive cache. The project was put on hold in 2008 while I got out of the Slashdot-posting basement and looked for a girlfriend. I finally got one around the end of 2008, and was able to spend 2009 adding a lot of features to the code, making a lot of releases of the code.
Well, around September of 2009, I got burnt out. Too much work for too little (almost no) pay. I stopped doing major development on the recursive code at that point, but have a really nice non-recursive cache with most of the foundation needed to make it a recursive cache. I do want to get back in to the project; but it's a lot of work and having a few thank you emails doesn't feel like enough compensation at times, especially when the other half of the emails are people asking me to implement their favorite pet feature for fun and for free, or asking for free email support. I finally put a plug on that nonsense by making it extremely clear that I only answer private email for people willing to pay me. Here are some of my rants I blogged about. I do get the occasional "you made this nice DNS server, we would like to hire you" email, but haven't gotten a job from that yet.
I do want to finish up the recursive code, and put closure on my DNS server project, but I just haven't gotten myself in the "develop free software" mindset again.
Maybe it's time to stop goofing around on Slashdot and finish up the code. :)
MaraDNS is an open-source DNS server.
at some point common sense will tell you that this project isn't going anywhere and your job may be in trouble and maybe i should look for another job? it's like all the dot coms from 10 years ago where people drank the kool aid and thought that investors will just keep feeding them more money to have fun at the office even though there is no profit and no one has any idea how to make a profit
Kick ass and chew bubble gum, Damn I'm all out of money!
... I saw him yesterday in Avatar.
I had to laugh today when I signed into Slashdot to see we are still talking about Duke Nukem.
I went to eat some animal crackers and the box said, "Do not eat if seal is broken." I opened the box and sure enough..
He's been keeping this stunt up for months. And now I could really go for a pizza.
Kwisatz Haderach
Sell the spice to CHOAM
This Mahdi took Shaddam's Throne
I will make my own game with Black Jack... and strippers! Oh they tried and failed? Oh crap!
"Ones and zeros were everywhere. I even think I saw a two!" - Bender
Tycho said it best, "...there are lessons about what makes for good play still bottled up in Duke Nukem 3D, lessons haven't truly informed the last thirteen years of industry progress." If anything at all comes from the DNF fiasco, I hope that some younger gamers (and developers!) go back and give D3D a playthrough.
Maybe it's not as great as we remember but it sure as hell deserved a better fate than it got.
--- Do you believe in the day?
It sounds like, from the article, Broussard never really got the concept of iterative development. It sounds like 4 or times they had a game *almost* done, and then scrapped it. Why? I mean, on the one hand, I do understand the idea of not releasing crap that dilutes your 'name brand', but the article author seems to have indicated that every time they demo'ed their 'current' generation of tech, the crowd was wowed.
In the 10 years from 1998-2008 they could have released 4 or 5 great games, each one getting better than the last. Each one making some revenue to help you fund the next version. I've come to appreciate that developing software isn't a destination, it's a journey. Make a new version, give yourself a well-defined, finite set of new features, develop them, sell that version, then start working on the next version which adds all the cool features you just weren't able to work into the last version, but wished you had.
One of the points in the article was that they scrapped the Quake II engine for Unreal, because Q2 just couldn't render the outside deserts around Las Vegas the way they wanted. I think, faced with the same problem, I would have just said, "No outside levels in this version - if we can't make them look decent, don't make them at all; we'll do it in the next version" - although, possibly I could see that one reboot as being necessary - probably the game would have been really missing something if there were no outdoor environments. So, I could see that change could have been necessary, switching to Unreal, but once they switched, they should have committed to shipping *a* game based on that engine, and only worried about changing up engines once they started work on the *next* game, after shipping DNF.
Well, at least young'uns like me can learn from 3DR's mistake.
eDuke32 is an open sourced Duke Nukem 3D project. It needs the Duke Nukem 3D game data files to work, and if you lost your Duke CD they can sell you a copy for $5.99. It works with Windows, Linux, and Mac OSX, but only the Windows version is compiled, you have to compile the Linux and Mac OSX versions; although they claim to have a link to precompiled Mac OSX files.
It is not Duke Nukem Forever but it has some advanced features and a link to Dukeworld to get fan made content creation and new maps and levels to keep you playing Duke Nukem almost forever. It can support resolutions the original couldn't and fixes a lot of game killing bugs the DOS version suffered from.
Remember, Slashdot does not have a -1 disagree moderation, and no, troll, flamebait, and overrated are not substitutes.
“George’s genius was realizing where games were going and taking it to the next level...” No. From TFA, it appears that as far as DNF is concerned, George was not an innovator at all. Instead of coming up with his own ideas, he wasted 12 years trying to play catch-up to every new shiny thing that got released.
Thats ironic - you're mocking him without realizing that you just made his point... There are NO games out there that have replicated the variety in DN3D - let alone improved on that. They've chosen to look pretty instead of introducing new concepts. And DN3D came out 15 years ago!
Can you do this in any other game - Setup a decoy in an elevator. Plant a pipe bomb. Go to a security terminal. Watch until your opponent triggers the elevator and opens it - set off pipe bomb remotely as they shoot at nothing.
And its not just what the original poster listed - don't forget about:
-unique sounds for walking on every surface (you could tell where your opponent was just by listening carefully)
-3D multilevel environments (even if "technically" bridges)
-Taunts
-Working Mirrors
-Jet Pack
-Semi-destructible environments
-Freeze Ray (expansion)
-Portals (expansion)
-Shrink Ray (expansion)
-Microwave gun (expansion)
I'm probably forgetting more stuff here - its been 10 years since I played last.
There's another name for what killed DNF: "feature creep". Classic mistake. So is hiring extra people to work on a project that's already late.
After reading the article, it's blindingly obvious that what really killed the project was nothing but bad project management.
"Shipping is a feature. A really important feature. Your product must have it."
Visit http://ringbreak.dnd.utwente.nl/~mrjb/growingbettersoftware to download your free copy of the book
I refuse to believe that they've cancled this... *nah* *nah* *nah* I can't hear you.. AC - patiently holding my breath since 1997
It's ok.. I heard a rumour that it is going to come pre installed on the Apple tablet.
It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it.
Well, considering the time it took, the kids that played DN are now old enough to buy Mature rated games, so...
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Someone posted a link to the WIRED story yesterday and one of the responses was from Jason Bergman who worked for Shacknews at one point as a writer and later moved on to Take Two and now works for Bethesda. In the discussion he posted:
Which naturally got the "Well how could you even know?" response, to which he responded:
Granted this is from someone who used to work at Take Two, which is the company somewhat demonized in the article, so there may be some bias in play there, but it sounds like some of the stuff in this article may just be flat wrong.
That said, this article is probably the best it can be under the circumstances, given that no one can really talk too much about it because of the lawsuit.
Schnapple
The part of the story that needs to be talked about a bit more is the under-recognized talent that worked on Duke 3D and made it so much fun. 3D Realms got lucky once because of a brilliant young programmer named Ken Silverman http://www.advsys.net/ken/ who wrote the engine while he was still in high school, and the talents of their design team, people like Levelord http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Gray_(game_designer) and others. The management of the company took credit for the success of Duke 3D. But once the talent left, management lived for years off the residual income from the various Duke ports and publisher advances while showing their utter lack of competence by being unable to ship a single product. While we mourn Duke and scorn Broussard and Miller let's remember the fine work of the team. Good work, guys!
"The perfect is the enemy of the good." My bias has always towards getting a product into the hands of customers, not towards academic correctness. Yes, the story of DNF should be taught as a textbook case in bad product management. Rule #1: if you spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on third-party tools and then decide not to use them, you should be fired for bad judgment, pure and simple.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
I'd tend to agree with you too. My theory is that basically, an individual who would be willing to put up with the "taboo" nature of the industry, the labeling of your character that comes with the territory, and the relatively high risk to one's personal safety -- all because it's "easy money, compared to other jobs out there" is the type who isn't likely to do well in school either.
Good intentions don't count for much, if you're too lazy to act on them.
Honestly, I don't have any problems with a woman deciding to market her body/looks/dance moves by way of a strip club. It's no less "valid" a way to earn a living than anything else. But most of the time, I think they attract immature ladies who just want to "party and have a good time", and aren't thinking long-term enough to realize their looks aren't going to last forever. The fact they receive so much cash money that there's strong motivation to hide from the IRS is another factor (at least here in the USA). I was good friends with a former stripper who told me she literally raked in thousands per week when she was 18 or 19, working at the right clubs in New York. But after a while, her biggest problem was literally figuring out what to do with the cash. Most of the strippers bought a lot of clothes, and a used sports or luxury car or something ... But after that? They tend to blow it on drugs and drinking, partying, going out to eat at expensive places, hotels and travel ... Actually saving it would quickly mean you had traceable income, and you'd get stuck getting taxed on it.
There's probably an untapped niche market here for financial advisors/money managers for people in the adult entertainment industry ... but again, the challenge would be getting immature 18 year olds to take any interest in it and TRUST someone with their money.
I haven't really been following this; so I read TFA.
Two things leap to mind:
1. The sequel always sucks. He should have realized from the outset that you do a sequel to cash in. Shovel that sequel! There really is no other way. Even if the sequel was actually just as good or slightly better, it will always suck because it can't duplicate the effect of seing a blockbuster for the first time. Note, this is not true if the original was not a blockbuster or particularly popular. A movie/game example doesn't leap to mind; but think of any cover of a Bob Dylan song. At any rate, the psychology of sequel reception seems readily apparent to me, and I suspect to just about anybody. How could they not see that?
2. At what point should they have realized that there was another model available besides "ship finished product"? I'm referring to the "perpetual beta" model of Google, or a subscripion model, or perhaps giving free upgrades for a couple years after the game came out.
Finally, wow! 12 years at a failed project??? That's just staggering but I bet it's not a record. The record probably comes from the defense industry and may or may not be classified.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
Because there is an IP fight between them and the publisher.
Excellent post. That's a real issue. I had my bank account frozen twice when I had my stripper roommate. I would put her ones in and withdraw twenties, the bank didn't like getting four stuffed envelopes of ones every night, I guess.
I actually testified at the state house that the sex workers in my city need 401Ks and tax advice more than they need prison terms or 'rescuing'.
"Sometimes, I think Trent just needs a cup of hot chocolate and a blankie." -Tori Amos on Nine Inch Nails
I've heard that the game was pretty far along when they switched to the Unreal engine. It's true that Unreal was a much better engine than Quake II... But, there have been many open source projects demonstrating that those game engines can pretty easily be upgraded. They could have saved themselves license money and avoided re-making all their assets by going that route instead.
I myself used to run an indie game project. We were making our own game engine, and at the time, I was a pretty naive programmer. I liked to implement everything myself (reinventing the wheel). I was also never satisfied with the quality of what we had made, and so we restarted the engine development twice. This lead to other members of the team losing motivation, and the game never got completed. I think it's pretty easy to not be satisfied with what you have, but the lesson I took from this project is "refactor/reuse, don't recreate". Refactoring programming code can seem tedious, but in the end, it's always faster than starting completely from scratch, and you avoid losing what you already have.
It's more like picking up trash at a public park or nature preserve - it helps everyone.