Duke Nukem Forever Drifts To 2005?

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'."

Let me be the first to say

[dtfinch]

HAHAHAHAHA

Maybe when it comes out I'll have a system powerful enough to run it.

Apt Title

[Canar]

As it has undoubtedly been pointed out bazillions of times already, Duke Nukem Forever is more likely the expected wait time than the title of the product.

Why couldn't they take the funding that's going into DNF and use that to resurrect Black Isle? That'd certainly be a better use of that money.

It frustrates me to no end that Black Isle--who was producing many good games--went under, while 3D realms still has the cash to plug away at this hunk of vapourware.

The Last Ninja 4

[Per Wigren]

This sounds just like the game I've been waiting for since the end of the 80s: The Last Ninja 4 [lemon64.com].. First releasedate was sometime in 2000, then the releasedate has drifted about half a year every 6 months... It was supposed to be released for the Game Cube Q4 2003 [nintendo-europe.com], but I haven't heard a single word about it for a long time now...
SimonSays [simonsays.com] still says "September 2003" for the X-Box version but no more news there... Amazon says February 2004 [amazon.com]...
The story continues... ;)

Re:E gad

[MachDelta]

All I ever heard about was the one engine switch from Quake II to Unreal.
I dunno if they're still using the Unreal/UT era engine (v436) though, or if they've upgraded to the (Unreal) Warfare series (v2227+). I guess it's possible they're pulling a Half-Life, and taking an old, but licensed engine, and slapping new features on it as they go. That might explain the delay, even if it doesn't excuse it.

Running Gag

[Kris_J]

Previously on Duke Nukem Forever: Penny Arcade [penny-arcade.com], Atari 2600 [3drealms.com]. The Atari 2000 version is actually a real cart.

Re:E gad

[Anonymous Coward]

I had heard they had a recent upgrade, not completely certain about that, but was pretty sure they were going on Warfare. I thought they were on Lithtech for a while, weren't they? I had also gotten the impression that they had switched engines more than 3 times. Would love to get more info on this if anyone has it. Just for fun, y'know.

It's a turkey deserving to be put down

[Anonymous Coward]

They really should just quietly cancel this steaming pile. It looked great 3 years ago, but now they can only be hopelessly playing catch-up. Can you imagine how demoralized and uninspired the team must be, re-drawing all the textures year after year just to keep up with technology and artistic standards?? UGH.

3DR and DNF

[Reverend Raven]

I would figure, given the nature of PC Games to be little more than slap-dash buggy pieces of doodoo for the last few years that more of you /.ers would support 3DR and their quest to make an awesome game.

Too much hype for this game you say? Well that's hard to believe...especially since 3D Realms hasn't publically said anything about it since 2001. This isn't Daikatana with full page ads in PC Gamer...or Derek Smart posting to every messageboard/IRC channel. This isn't even publisher funded (otherwise I'm sure they would have forced 3DR to release years ago). 3DR is spending all of their own cash (yes kids, Duke Nukem is a profitable franchise!) to make what they hope to be a kick-ass game. So if it bombs it's on no one's head but their own.

Duke3D was released in 1996, and the work on DNF started late 1998. Yeah they've switched engines and yeah according to Georgie B (check the 3drealms.com forums, to lazy to link) by their own accord DNF is "very late". But as another poster said..no game before or since has had the attitude and atmosphere that Duke3D did (even if they borrowed a lot of the Dukeisms from the Evil Dead flicks).

Duke (3D and the franchise itself) has made a LOT of money..aside from the money Duke3D made for the PC version..there were console versions..then console exclusive games..not to mention the action figures, statues, et al. So this isn't like reviving a dead franchise. When DNF is released chances are it will sell many copies...if not only from the "Holy Shit it's done!" factor..but it's Duke Nukem. As one of the mascots of PC gaming everybody knows who Duke is...or they've atleast heard of him.

Plus console ports, expansions, etc....yeah, it'll end up in the black.

People (and by people I mean the gaming press and gamers alike) are pissed 'cause 3DR won't release screenshots every third day or suck PC Gamers dick to get a cover story or what have you. So they want the title to fail even though no one's seen the game since 2001. To me this is a sign that 3DR actually...*gasp!* gives a rat's ass about the quality of their game and they want the best piece of code possible, and they don't want to spoil all the neat things for the audience by releasing movies and daily screen shots. For this 3DR should be commended, not condemned.

Alls I want to know is..when it's finally released and all is said and done...how much will production have run? I gotta figure it's atleast $30 million by now. But I'll gladly pay my $50 to see what it's like.