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PAX Prime 2010: Playing Duke Nukem Forever

Posted on Thursday, September 9 @ 19:02:13 Eastern by Blake_Morse

Now with 100% more poop-flinging action! Hail to the King of PAX, baby!Yes, it's real. It's really, really real! Gearbox has picked up the rights to the game with the longest running dev cycle in history and is planning to launch it next year, approximately sixteen years after it was announced. Duke Nukem Forever will make it to store shelves, people!

Check out the vid for my opinion on the return of the man who you don't want to be around when there's no more bubblegum.

So you're probably curious about what you might've missed during that brief intermission. Well, first off we were treated to a cuss-filled, enthusiastic introduction to the trailer by Gearbox big-wig, Randy Pitchford, who explained why he felt the need to make this happen. You see, Randy got his start with 3D Realms back in the day and has a softspot for the company that gave him his start.

He also knows that if he actually releases DNF in a timely fashion that it will make tons of cash. Seems like a real no-brainer to me. Show some love to your old bosses and make enough money to live the rest of your days up to your neck in hookers, like Duke would want you to. He also told us that there were no screenshots out there on teh interwebs and we should feel free to leak some. Which is exactly what I did. As I waited for my turn on a console, I snapped a couple shots and uploaded them to our Facebook, which you should totally go check out.

The demo that they had at PAX consisted of two levels. The first thing you do in the game is take a leak in a urinal; from there, all bets are off and it just gets even crazier.

Unlike myself, our intrepid cameraman Bill took the time to look around the bathroom and his exploration paid off; in what is the first among what will most likely be many "easter eggs", a toilet with interactive poop that you can pick up and throw at the walls like a fecalphiliac in a mental hospital. Oh, yeah. This is a Duke Nukem game.

Once you get out of the john and through the brief tutorial on the controls, it's time to fight a giant alien boss in the middle of a football field. What can I say? It was a classic, hardcore throwdown between a giant alien and a guy with a rocket launcher handgun.

Once you beat the boss, it becomes apparent that this was in fact a game within a game as the camera panned out from the victory screen to show Mr. Nukem himself holding a 360 controller while getting a BJ from a couple schoolgirls who promptly ask him if the game was any fun. To which he replied something like, "It better be! It took them 12 fucking years to make it!"

After that I was dropped into another level that found me driving a monster truck through a desert wasteland while running over pig people. Oh, such sweet rapture as swine became bacon underneath the tires. A car can only go so long without needing more fuel, so when the tank hit "E", it was time to head out on foot.

Naturally I found myself in a shootout in no time at all, and since this was just a demo, there were plenty of weapons around to go hog wild with (pardon the pun). Shotguns and pistols adorned my arsenal along with the fan-favorite shrink ray that turns enemies into bite-size morsels perfectly fit for stomping into oblivion.

As I trekked my way up a desert mountainside, I came upon an outpost with a mounted machine gun. Bonus round time! Well, it wasn't really a bonus round, but a troop of pig-men rushing headlong into my range of fire certainly felt like one.

And then? Well, who knows at this point. The brief but enjoyable demo ended there and left me salivating for more raunchy goodness.

This could be cruelest, most elaborate joke ever played on the gaming community at large, but I highly doubt that. From my brief time playing Duke Nukem Forever I can say that it has maintained its Dukeyness despite the passing of time. With any luck we'll see an actual finished product at some point next year.