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| Duke Nukem 3D | |
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | 3D Realms |
| Publisher(s) | Apogee Software |
| Designer(s) | George Broussard & Todd Replogle |
| Engine | Build |
| Released | January 29, 1996 (PC) May 25, 1997 (Mac) December 3, 1997 (PlayStation) 1997 (Sega Saturn) |
| Genre | First-person shooter |
| Mode(s) | Single player, Multiplayer |
| Ratings | ESRB: M (Mature) RSAC: V4 (Wanton and gratuitous violence), N1 (Revealing attire), L1 (Mild Expletives) OFLC: MA15+ BBFC: 18 |
| Platform(s) | PC (MS-DOS), Mac, PlayStation, Sega Saturn, game.com, Sega Mega Drive (Brazil only), source ports to many other platforms |
| Media | CD-ROM, cartridge |
| Video games Portal |
Duke Nukem 3D is a first-person shooter computer game developed by 3D Realms and published by Apogee Software. It was released on January 29, 1996. Duke Nukem 3D features the adventures of Duke Nukem, a character that had previously appeared in the platform games Duke Nukem and Duke Nukem II which were also published by Apogee.
Contents |
Synopsis
"Murderous aliens have landed in futuristic Los Angeles, and humans suddenly find themselves atop the endangered species list. The odds are a million-to-one, just the way Duke likes it!" Taking on the role of Duke Nukem, players must fight through 28 levels spread over three chapters. (A commercial upgrade called The Plutonium Pak later added a fourth episode of 11 additional levels.) As usual for a first-person shooter, players encounter a whole host of different enemies, and can engage them with a range of weaponry. As well as killing aliens to free the Earth, players must also solve puzzles to progress through the various levels. Some puzzles allow access to extra, hidden levels. Duke Nukem 3D is set "sometime in the early 21st century".[1]
Gameplay
Level design
The levels of Duke Nukem 3D take the player outdoors through rendered street scenes, military bases, deserts, flooded cities, space stations, moon bases and even Japanese villas. Levels were also designed in a fairly non-linear manner such that players can advantageously use air ducts, back doors and sewers to avoid enemies or find hidden secrets, which also makes the levels well suited to deathmatch. These locations are also filled with objects that the player can interact with (including light switches, toilets, pool tables, arcade games, closed-circuit cameras, and strippers).
Weapons
The game includes a range of lethal weapons, some of which, even today, are still unique to the Duke Nukem series. They range from Duke's "Mighty Foot", a basic melee attack, to pistols, Nordenfelt guns, pipe bombs, and a Laser Trip Bomb.
Equipment
Aside from weapons, Nukem's inventory also includes a series of items that can be picked up during play. A portable medkit allows players to heal themselves whenever they choose to. Steroids speed up player movement making transit through hostile territory easier. Nightvision goggles allow players to see enemies in the dark. The "HoloDuke" device projects a hologram of Duke that can be used to distract enemies. Protective boots allow the player to cross dangerously hot or toxic terrain. Where progress requires more aquatic legwork, an aqua-lung (called scuba gear) allows the player to take longer trips away from air. Perhaps most impressively, Duke's trademark jetpack allows the player to range fully in 3D, often to reach hidden weapons caches or extra health.
Monsters
The game features a wide range of monsters, some of which are aliens, others mutated humans (the LAPD has been turned into "Pig-cops", with LARD emblazoned on their uniforms). As is usual for a first-person shooter, Nukem encounters a large number of lesser foes, and a small number of boss enemies (usually at the end of chapters). Like Duke, these enemies have access to a wide range of weapons and equipment (some weaker enemies have jet packs). One of the enemies, the protozoid slimer, features a peculiar attack is that it doesn't feature either a long-range projectile weapon, or a close-range melee armament; instead, when it gets close to the player, its face (a large green blob with a fanged mouth) appears occluding most things on screen, starting to chew out health from Duke. While they're extremely weak and can be killed with a single pistol shot, they do a considerable damage, and must be eliminated as quickly as possible.
Multiplayer
Duke Nukem 3D features multiplayer. At the time of its release, Internet-based gaming was just beginning. Duke Nukem 3D did not support the TCP/IP client/server model, instead basing its network play on the IPX LAN, modem or serial cable. Duke Nukem 3D players often either battled modem-to-modem, using the $20.00 IPX network utility Kali or the Total Entertainment Network (TEN) online pay service. Kali allowed users to connect to a chat room to host and join games. The Total Entertainment Network featured hundreds of Duke 3D players online at any given time, but players had to pay a monthly fee for it (originally $5.00, gradually increased to $20.00). The game's own levels were often used as the battlegrounds for these encounters and users were able to create their own levels (or maps).
Technology
Duke Nukem 3D's graphic engine was an evolutionary step forward from the Doom engine. While the levels were still defined as 2D maps, the capabilities of Ken Silverman's Build engine allowed more complex levels than Doom and Dark Forces. Most notably, the game supports diagonal slopes in the floors, which was not possible with the entirely "top-down" level design of other contemporary shooters. It also supports mouse aiming (though aiming up and down distorts the graphics due to a lack of perspective correction), which later became the norm for FPS games. While Doom was limited to doors opening and closing only by sliding up and down, the Build engine also introduced doors/walls that can move sideways. The Doom engine usually only moved a single platform at a time in response to a player event, while the Build scripting system allows a whole string of moving and sliding actions, synchronized with sound effects, to create collapsing buildings, earthquakes, and walls that crumble apart when hit with explosives. One of the more advanced effects that went far beyond the limits of the Doom engine is the horizontal sliding platform that can move the player inside a small sliding room, to create subway cars moving in a timed sequence around a ring-shaped track. Since Doom was not a fully 3D engine, it was considered to be a 2.5D game. This 2.5D engine design limited Doom to relatively simple non-overlapping map designs since it is not possible for there to be an exposed bridge or balcony that the player can both see over and walk under. In Doom, only a simple moving platform rising up in front of the player could allow the player to cross over a path they previous walked along below. The Build engine solves this problem by allowing multiple overlapping 2D paths to cross through the same 2D location. The key is that while inside one of these spaces, it is not possible to see into the other space, and so the 2.5D engine has no problem rendering one space or the other even though the map data literally shows the two areas to be occupying the same place. Several Duke Nukem 3D maps exploit this engine feature to create bizarre mind-bending maps where multiple large rooms all seem to be occupying one 3D space. One secret level in particular ("Lunatic Fringe" from episode 2, Lunar Apocalypse) has a map where the player can travel 720 degrees around a circle and not cross their path. This would be much more difficult to duplicate with modern true-3D map editors and engines. To resolve the problem of not having balconies or bridges that the player can walk over or under, instead special objects are used by the Build engine that are not actually part of the flat 2D map design. Instead they are a special type of decorative sprite inserted into the world, similar to the breakable cameras, flowerpots, lights. These special large sprites allow the player to walk over the object and under it as if it were an actual part of the map, to create the illusion of a true 3D space. However these special objects have a highly restricted shape, typically as a perfectly square or rectangular non-sloping structure, greatly limiting their usefulness in the map design to simple bridges, balconies, or exposed rectangular air ducts.
Controversy
The game has been heavily attacked by some critics, who allege that it promotes pornography and murder. For example:
"Duke Nukem 3D moves the 'shooter' through pornography stores, where Duke can use XXX sex posters for target practice. Duke throws cash at a prostituted woman telling her to 'Shake it, Baby' his gun ever ready. In the game bonus points are awarded for the murder of these mostly prostituted and partially nude women. Duke blows up stained glass windows in an empty church or goes to strip clubs where Japanese women lower their kimonos exposing their breasts. Duke is encouraged to kill defenseless, often bound women.
— Media Watch, Teaching Boys To Kill
George Broussard, president of 3D Realms, defends the game, noting its success and arguing that consumers obviously do not find the content abusive or immoral. However, success with some consumers may not be evidence that Duke Nukem 3D is more widely acceptable. Significantly, the only women that appear in the game are either strippers, prostitutes, cheerleaders or alien prisoners, although a few of the following franchise sequels changed this, with Duke fighting alongside strong female characters. This treatment of women is extreme, even by the standards of video games. It could be viewed that their presence is intended as an ironic and over-the-top send-up of Hollywood action-film stereotypes, but, unsurprisingly, it causes offense, even if this was never intended by the developers. Due to a gunman's rampage through a movie theatre in Brazil, Duke Nukem 3D was banned in that country along with Quake, Doom and several other violent first-person shooters. The Brazil rampage was allegedly inspired by Duke Nukem 3D's opening level "Hollywood Holocaust" (Episode 1, Mission 1), where a firefight with aliens takes place inside a cinema. Despite this ban, Duke Nukem 3D was subsequently being published in a computer magazine, and other titles such as Quake and Doom are still sold openly in Brazil. As a response to the criticism encountered, censored versions of the game were released in certain countries to avoid having it banned altogether. In Australia, the game was originally refused classification on release. 3D Realms repackaged the game with a parental lock, but due to a mix-up, the uncensored data remained on the game disc and many players hacked and played the uncensored version. The OFLC then attempted to have the game pulled from the shelves, but it was discovered that the distributor had notified them of this fact and the rating could not be surrendered. Six months later, the game was later reclassified and released uncensored with an MA15+ rating. In Germany, the Bundesprüfstelle für jugendgefährdende Medien placed the game on the List of Media Harmful to Young People or Index.
Addons
Plutonium PAK/Atomic Edition
The Atomic Edition of Duke Nukem 3D was released in November 1996, and contained the original 3 episode game as well as a new eleven-level fourth episode. The Plutonium PAK was also released as an upgrade package to convert the original release of Duke Nukem 3D (v1.3d) to the new Atomic Edition (v1.4, later patched to v1.5). It introduces three enemies: the Protector Drone, the Pig Cop Tank, and a new boss known as The Queen. It also includes a new weapon, the Microwave Expander. It also has several improvements to the scripting language of the game, allowing the game's active modding community to create new enemies and items without overwriting the existing ones. A feature exclusive to the Atomic Edition is the Fake Multiplayer computer controlled bots which can be launched at the DOS prompt. These bots were capable of putting up a decent offline fight against the player, in order of giving a glimpse of what the player could find in real online games or if the player does not have any available connection. They can also be useful for testing DukeMatch sessions offline during the creation of a map.
EDuke
Following the release of the Doom source code in 1997, many of those in the modding community began wishing for a similar source code release from 3D Realms. The last major game to make use of the Duke Nukem 3D source code was Team TNT's WWII GI in 1999. Its programmer, Matthew Saettler, expanded greatly upon the scripting language used by modders to change many aspects of the game. Saettler let it be known that he was willing to expand further upon WWII GI's scripting language, and shortly thereafter agreed to make his enhancements available for Duke Nukem 3D with the permission of 3D Realms. 3D Realms approved the project. Saettler was the sole programmer, working with several mod authors to beta-test the new addition that would carry the Duke Nukem 3D version numbering to v2.0 and be titled EDuke. EDuke was released as a patch for Atomic Edition users on July 28, 2000, and included a demo mod made by several beta testers. The demo included new sector-based effects, sprite-based elevators, ladders, a bouncing particle fountain, a personal teleporter, and a more sophisticated translucent water effect. Saettler has since archived his original Eduke site for reference.
Duke Caribbean: Life's a Beach
This is an unofficial add-on. Duke relaxes on a tropical island when he discovers that the aliens are having their own "vacation". It features levels created by Charlie Wiederhold, who was later hired by 3D Realms to work on Duke Nukem Forever, the upcoming sequel to 3D.
LameDuke
LameDuke is an early development, beta version of Duke Nukem 3D which was released by 3D Realms as a bonus one year after the release of the official version. Lameduke has been released as is, with no support. It is currently available to download from the 3DRealms FTP [1]. Lameduke features four episodes: Mrr Caliber, Mission Cockroach, Suck Hole and Hard Landing. Some weapons were removed and/or altered from the original versions
Source code ports
The source code to the Duke Nukem 3D v1.5 executable, which uses the Build engine, was released under the GPL on April 1, 2003. However, the game content still remains the sole property of 3D Realms. The game was quickly ported by enthusiasts to modern OSes. As of 2007, these ports gave the game a second life in multiplayer games through the Internet and a growing community is still actively playing.
Standard ports
The first Duke Nukem 3D port was from icculus.org. It is a cross-platform port that allows the game to be played on BeOS, FreeBSD, Linux, Mac OS X, Solaris, Windows and probably runs on others. The icculus.org codebase would later be used in the Duke3d_w32 (Rancidmeat) port, and later, the xDuke port. One popular port is Jonathon Fowler's JFDuke3D, which in December 2003 received backing from the original author of Build, programmer Ken Silverman. Fowler, in cooperation with Ken, released a new version of JFDuke3D using Polymost, an OpenGL-enhanced renderer for Build, which allows hardware acceleration and 3D model support, along with 32 bit color high resolution textures. Another port based on JFDuke3D called xDuke (unrelated to the xDuke port based on icculus.org/duke3d) runs on the Xbox. Silverman has since helped Jonathon Fowler with a large portion of other engine work, including updating the network code and continuing to maintain various other aspects of the engine. Projects such as the Duke 3D High Resolution Pack [2] were started in order to take advantage of the various engine improvements and attempt to update Duke's graphical resources almost to the level of modern games. Plans are still in the works to include additional engine features as time goes on. However, JFDuke3D appears to be on hiatus as no new versions have appeared since late 2005.
EDuke and other ports
The first port aimed at expanding features for mod authors was an experimental port called CDuke, authored by Colourless. It cleaned up and enhanced some unused code in the original source designed to allow translucent sector-based water and other "sector over sector" effects. The implementation was not perfect, but showed promise. CDuke was also the first port to demonstrate voxels within Duke Nukem 3D, which had been seen in other Build engine games. The port ceased production shortly after it was released. EDuke is a branch of Duke Nukem 3D that was officially released by 3D Realms in 2000; it focused primarily on enhancing the CON scripting language in ways which allowed those modifying the game to do much more with the scripting system than originally possible. Around May of 2003, not long after the release of the Duke Nukem 3D source code, Blood project manager Matt Saettler released the source for both EDuke 2.0, the version of EDuke released by 3D Realms, and EDuke 2.1, the test version of what was to become the next official EDuke release. A few ports emerged (most notably WinEDuke and EDuke 2.1.1), but it was not until the release of Richard Gobeille's EDuke32 (an extended version of JFDuke3D which incorporates Saettler's EDuke code) in 2004 that EDuke became a real community focus. EDuke32 has seen consistent and frequent releases, often giving the community access to experimental new engine features weeks before the next JFDuke3D release. Among the various enhancements, support for OGG music was added in September 2007, allowing the engine to play true music for the first time. It is to be noted that the upgrade is not yet part of the EDuke32 mainstream versions. A pack of the remade music was compiled and is planned to be included in future releases of the HRP. [3]
Console ports
In 1997, Duke Nukem 3D was ported to all the major consoles of the time. The PlayStation version, Duke Nukem: Total Meltdown, includes six extra areas and a secret level, the latter which was also included in the PC version. It also features new enemies and a new boss.[4] The Sega Saturn version was ported by Lobotomy Software and published by Sega. It retains the original name and uses Lobotomy's SlaveDriver engine. This version uses the Sega NetLink for online gaming, and has built-in support for the Saturn's analog pad. It also includes a hidden mini-game. The Nintendo 64 version was retitled Duke Nukem 64. It features a split screen 4-player mode. In-game music was removed from this version and many items have been renamed to avoid drug and sex references. Other changes include the final boss now a different 3D model. In 1998, it was ported to the Sega Mega Drive by Tec Toy. It was built from the ground up by Tec Toy. A version of Duke Nukem 3D was also released for the Game.com, Tiger's short lived handheld system.
Theme song
Duke Nukem's theme song was created by Lee Jackson. Its title is "Grabbag". The thrash metal band Megadeth recorded the song as a bonus track off their 1999 album, Risk, replete with sound bytes of Duke's one-liners.
Duke Nukem Forever
In 1997, 3D Realms announced a direct sequel titled Duke Nukem Forever. It has been shown at two E3s (1998 and 2001) and has gone through several engine changes and restarts. The developers have stated that the game will be released "when it's done." Most recently, 3D Realms released a teaser trailer in Deember 2007 and announced that composer Jeremy Soule was working with the team.
References
External links
Reviews
Source ports
- Duke3d_w32 — Duke Nukem 3D port for Windows
- EDuke32 — EDuke port for Windows/Linux
- icculus.org/duke3d — Duke Nukem 3D port for BeOS/FreeBSD/Linux/Mac OS X/Solaris/Windows/Other
- JFDuke3D — Duke Nukem 3D port for Windows/Linux/Other
- xDuke — Duke Nukem 3D port for Windows
- High Resolution Pack - Duke Nukem 3D High Resolution Pack
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|---|---|
| Computer | Duke Nukem · Duke Nukem II · Duke Nukem 3D · Manhattan Project · Duke Nukem Forever |
| Console | Duke Nukem 64 · Time to Kill · Zero Hour · Land of the Babes |
| Handheld | Duke Nukem · Advance · Mobile |
| Miscellaneous | Grabbag |
