Game Debate #165: Duke Nukem 3D

[Reed Rothchild | 9,549]

[Sumez | 2,968]

One of the best FPS games still. hold ups surprisingly well on a replay, thanks to the incredible level design. It's no Doom tho

Edited August 2, 2023 by Sumez

[Sydpinkfloyd | 12]

I actually replayed this one about two years ago for the first time in 20 years. I was surprised at how much I disliked it compared to my memories of the game. For me the biggest issue was the uneven difficulty; I can play through Doom, Quake and Shadow Warrior on the second highest difficulty with no problems, but this one seems to ramp up way too high in the first level of each episode. It kind of sucked the fun out of it for me. 
 

7/10. For games using the same engine, I prefer shadow warrior (slightly improved game engine and more even difficulty). 

[Bearcat-Doug | 5,105]

It's a good game, but I'd rather play Doom. 6/10.

[Hammerfestus | 3,860]

Is Total Meltdown on PSX the same game?  Because I have feelings about that one but I never really played the pc version.

[mbd39 | 2,026]

It's a solid 7/10.

We had a 486 DX2-50 in the mid 90s and I remember how it choked on this game, especially the under water section.

 

[TDIRunner | 2,744]

3 hours ago, Hammerfestus said:

Is Total Meltdown on PSX the same game?  Because I have feelings about that one but I never really played the pc version.

It's pretty close.  It's a port of the PC game and includes the three original episodes.  Like most console ports of the time, it's not perfect and it includes some excusive levels.  I would say it's close enough to rate it here, but probably worth mentioning in your comment that your rating is based on the PS1 version.  

[TDIRunner | 2,744]

I probably prefer Doom, but this was still one of the best Doom clones and it still holds up today.  It's absolutely worth playing.

[Webhead123 | 679]

An amazing FPS and still very much worth playing today. While arguably the weakest of the 3D Realms Build Engine trilogy (which is to say that it is ever-so-slightly less totally fucking awesome than the two games that came after it) and despite my personal biases toward Doom, Duke 3D is still among the best in its genre. Tons of creativity and variety matched with great controls, enemy and stage design. It has some difficulty spikes which can be frustrating but it never gets so discouraging that you want to stop playing.

If Doom and Blood are 10's and Doom 2 and Shadow Warrior are 9.5's, then Duke 3D is a solid 9. Play it on modern computers with the conveniences of contemporary control schemes and high resolution through the wonderful "eDuke32" source port. You'll have a blast.

Now, if you'll excuse me, those alien bastards shot up my goddamn ride again.

Edited August 2, 2023 by Webhead123

[DefaultGen | 5,414]

It looks cool but I've never played more than the shareware as a kid. By the time I knew it existed, I was playing Quake and Unreal and it got lost in the shuffle of 100 other 90s shooters for me. I did have an annoying friend who made Duke quotes all the time though.

[DoctorEncore | 3,691]

While I know the game and have certainly booted it up numerous times in numerous formats, I've never given it dedicated playtime. Perhaps someday it will join the backlog.

[Sydpinkfloyd | 12]

6 hours ago, mbd39 said:

It's a solid 7/10.

We had a 486 DX2-50 in the mid 90s and I remember how it choked on this game, especially the under water section.

 

I remember having the same issue. Played it on an overclocked 486 DX 33 and it got real slow in the Death Row level when the security laser beams came into play. 

[RH | 4,923]

Three words--first LAN party!

We played this in High School at lunch.  My friends and I were math nerds and would hang out in the Math teacher's rooms during lunch.  They all had PCs and we had this installed along the Math hallway in half the classrooms.

The teachers were cool about it too.

The campaigns were cool and as much as I loved GoldenEye when friends came over to my house, or Half-Life which I played for 4 straight years in college, this game was my first multiplayer FPS and because of that, it's possibly my favorite of those three.

I gave it a 9 but I may need to bump that to a 10.

[Hammerfestus | 3,860]

9. So as implied by my other comment my experience is with the PlayStation version.  I‘ve got some really fond memories of playing this game.  Played way more of this than I ever played Doom.  

Also, in an era when they weren’t nearly as accessible to a teenage boy as they are now — boobs.  Thank you Duke. 

One interesting twist for me is that I got this game about the same time as I got ReLoad.  I listened to a lot of ReLoad while playing Duke Nukem.  At this point I associate one with the other and I thoroughly enjoy them both.

[G-type | 2,483]

It loses a point for shamelessly ripping off dialogue from Sam Raimi and John Carpenter

[Tulpa | 3,517]

6 minutes ago, G-type said:

It loses a point for shamelessly ripping off dialogue from Sam Raimi and John Carpenter

It ripped off a lot more than that. About 90% of Duke's quotes come from somewhere else.

[Sumez | 2,968]

It's almost like they were tributes 

[fcgamer | 4,729]

Never played it though I'm interested, had friends who had it back in the day.

[Tulpa | 3,517]

10 minutes ago, Sumez said:

It's almost like they were tributes 

The same way Simba was Disney's tribute to Kimba.

[G-type | 2,483]

8 minutes ago, Sumez said:

It's almost like they were tributes 

Bruce Campbell says: "They're rip-off artists. Let them get their own damn material. It's called hiring a writer. They're blatantly ripping it off and if I was any kind of litigious guy they would've gotten a phone call by now. It's depressing and I think it's wrong."

[Sumez | 2,968]

You don't really need a writer to make up the line "groovy", it's literally one word. Duke says it because Ash saying it is iconic, it's a reference, that's all it is.

Edited August 3, 2023 by Sumez

[wongojack | 217]

I'll never play this.  I saw the shareware version of Doom when I was a late teenager, and I eventually played Wolfenstein 3d, but for whatever reason the FPS explosion just did not hit me.  I saw it as an intermediate step to 3d.  They couldn't show your character, so they just didn't try.  I was waiting for when the genre would evolve to full 3d without ever suspecting that people actually WANTED to play in 1st person . . .

Anyway, I never even paid enough attention to know that Duke Nukem existed, and if I ever did see a clip or reference to it, I probably just assumed it was for teenage boys who liked the "Eat My Shorts" era of the Simpsons.

[Webhead123 | 679]

20 minutes ago, Sumez said:

You don't really need a writer to make up the line "groovy", it's literally one word. Duke says it because Ash saying it is iconic, it's a reference, that's all it is.

Yes. It's called homage. Duke 3D and, in fact, all the 3D Realms trilogy make some subtle and many not-so-subtle tributes to various lines and ideas from popular media. Blood alone has references to Army of Darkness, Friday the 13th, The Shining and about a dozen other films, all done in a manner that shows reverence.

[RH | 4,923]

18 hours ago, wongojack said:

I'll never play this.  I saw the shareware version of Doom when I was a late teenager, and I eventually played Wolfenstein 3d, but for whatever reason the FPS explosion just did not hit me.  I saw it as an intermediate step to 3d.  They couldn't show your character, so they just didn't try.  I was waiting for when the genre would evolve to full 3d without ever suspecting that people actually WANTED to play in 1st person . . .

Anyway, I never even paid enough attention to know that Duke Nukem existed, and if I ever did see a clip or reference to it, I probably just assumed it was for teenage boys who liked the "Eat My Shorts" era of the Simpsons.

To each there own but it’s not fair to completely write-off the early games within the genre just because they created “3D” effects by scaling sprites. Duke is, IMHO, the best example of an FPS of that engine type that includes single player and multiplayer campaigns. The story and jokes are just icing on the cake. It’s not a flawless title but D3D provided a lot to the hobby and we also can’t forget that 3D Realms provided the  level editor which kicked off a ton of fan made levels and games. (Did ID do that with Doom, or did people create hack/mods for it.)

Playing Duke 3D today does need a heavy does of nostalgia or you have to be a kid that can appreciate innovation from a historical context. That said, Duke didn’t really break that much ground more than it pulled many of the pieces together of what existed at that time in 3D FPS gaming and set a standard by what it did.

Oh, and one other thing, are you suggesting that you prefer 3rd Person Shooters over FPS? I mean, I can enjoy Shadows of the Empire as it was intended but there’s a reason why that style of shooter practically doesn’t exist any more.  FPSs get the character model out of the way so you can see more plus the camera angle for 3PS is always awkward.  Well, it’s often awkward.  It can work for scripted, linear section of platforms like Mario titles but with an FPS, the meed to roam free and see around forget areas makes it useful to experience the game as an FPS.

[wongojack | 217]

@RH - yes, I generally do not enjoy the first person perspective in games.  I don't care about 'scaling sprites' and older graphics styles - those are fine.  I have played MANY first person games in my life, and I don't like that I see less of the environment around the controllable actor.  It also feels like I'm cheated out of actually seeing the person/object I am controlling.

Ultimate pet peeve is when you aim and a giant gun comes up in your face, so you can see even less of the game area.  A close second is when the game gets cute and has you put on some kind of helmet to restrict your vision even more.  I'd rather just skip all of that.  Please let me just SEE your game.