Even when this game was announced, people were already sick of the snarky pop culture pastiche. And maybe fewer jokes about pissing would help, too.Duke Nukem Forever is part of a conspiracy amongst the video game companies to downplay vaporware.Think about it. The tragedy with Duke is that DNF made the character into what his detractors always thought defined him, rather than the absurdist mirror on a certain strain of pop culture he could be. So, if Duke is to come back in a proper new release (and that feels like a massive long-shot), then first and foremost the script really needs to lean back into the self-aware, ironic flavor, as well being a lot funnier and wittier. And while Duke Nukem 3D can hardly be described as a witty masterpiece, its tone definitely retained that self-deprecating ironic piss-taking.īut somewhere in DNF's troubled development, it lost sight of this, and Duke was turned too much into a character that we were supposed to look up to and think was actually cool and desirable in the real world. (Image credit: Future) Replaying Duke Nukem Forever: The takeawayĭuke was always a parody of an American action movie hero, an ironic character that poked fun out of ridiculous properties that took themselves super seriously. Maybe the version Duke played in-game was better than the Forever we all got. But this stuff isn't funny, it's just super cringe. Great, yet another attempt to make the exact same idea work as a joke. To which the other then adds in a sexy voice: I could carry you around in my pocket like a little pet.' Two women again see Duke in miniature, when one says: Then a little later, here's another example. You approach a woman and her son in Duke's casino, and the son says: Take this line from early in the game when Duke is miniaturized so that he is really small. You're left asking yourself constantly, is the game taking the piss out of itself and being self-deprecating and aware, or does it genuinely think this is cool, funny and fun? As it just isn't funny most of the time. (Image credit: Future) Addressing Forever's biggest problemĪll the game's other problems aside, though, DNF's script (and therefore tone) is its biggest problem in my opinion, as it just isn't anywhere near as funny and sharp as it should be, and frequently gets stuck somewhere between being serious and satirical. Personally, I wanted more of that cheesy punning, and less 'Suck it down!'. The game needed more 80s-style action-movie cheesy quips and less grunting-death-psycho.įor example, later in the game, when Duke gets his hands on a forklift truck, after plowing it into enemies he quips, 'Fork off!'. Yes, Duke is supposedly Earth's unwilling savior, and yes I do absolutely want to commit the violence with his arsenal of comical weapons 80s action movie hero-style, but these orations from Duke lead to a real tone shift that I just don't think works. What's also ugly are many of Duke's one-liners in this game, which alongside a series of macho grunts, often lead to just crude, unfunny insults, a good example being, 'Eat shit and die!' There's no charm or wit and the result is degrading to the character when repeated over and over, with a seemingly psychopathic Duke reveling in bringing murder and death to everything that stands in his way, and getting off on it. But in DNF it's nothing but poor, degrading depictions, and that makes it all feel, well, more than a little tasteless and Leisure Suite Larry sleazy.Ĭertain weapons, like the shotgun, feel better to use than others and are more fun. Yes, fine, we all know that Duke is a ladies' man in his world and it's part of his alpha dog schtick that he's always chasing after them and many are also irresistibly enamoured of him (as too are most of the men!), so I've got no problem with showing that. DNF is far from the only video game where this is an issue, sure, with the incredibly poor depictions of almost all female story characters in GTA V springing to mind, but still, here it is really, really marked. It would have been a great way to ground the tone as satire, not the superhero worship the game, consciously or not, mistakenly descends into. You save this woman who is trapped with you in a falling elevator lift and, after screaming for her life, she instantly responds once saved with, 'I'll go down with you any time'.

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