In Defense of Duke (Sort of): A Duke Nukem Forever Review

Disclaimer: This is the sole opinion of the writer and does not depict the views of anyone else attached to the site. This opinion seems mostly unpopular and I'm walkin' this path alone. Hell, they haven't even played the game.


So this review is going to be quite a bit different, and by that I mean really different. No pictures with semi-clever comments. No step by step walkthrough of its positives and negatives. It's not even getting a score. Instead, this is more of a direct response to the ass end of the reviews for Duke Nukem. Sure, some are decent. GamesRadar gave it a 6 and PC Gamer even gave it an 8, but this isn't about those. This is about the overwhelming amount of reviews that have given the game scores as low as 2's and 3's. I am not criticizing the outlets as a whole. All of them are reliable and legitimate which is why they are where they are now. I'm simply doing this because I don't understand the Duke hate. Before you read this, keep in mind that I am not a butt-hurt fanboy. The only game I've played in the series before this was 3D, which was really good, but it didn't have me looking into other games in the catalog. What I mean is, I understand the character of Duke, but I don't have a weird allegiance to him. I just don't like seeing games get scores below what they deserve, and in this case it was much too far spread.

We all know the laughable history of Duke Nukem Forever's development. That topic could take up a whole article itself, so I won't go into detail, but it is important to something I will say later. Anyway, as I already stated, Duke Nukem Forever has managed to "earn" scores as low as 2's and 3's, and when it was lucky, 5's. I understand that Duke is a polarizing figure. You either think he's funny because you see him as an over-the-top parody of the action hero, which he is, or you think he's an annoying jackass, which I can understand. But let's get one thing straight. Duke Nukem Forever did not deserve scores as low as a fucking 2. For reference, let's go through some other games that are widely considered to be garbage and received scores as low as DNF.


Would you prefer Duke Nukem's one-liners, or this moron yapping about staples of the platforming genre? If you answered the later you should die.

Video Game - E3 2011

This game was so bad I couldn't even find playthroughs of it on youtube. I had to find the review I remember X-Play doing forever ago. I know they gave it a 1, but IGN gave it a 3.


Then there's this asshole.

So what do these games have in common? Why do they all have scores that freaking low? Because they are all ungodly boring and border-line broken!


Does this look BROKEN to you?

So why is it getting scores this low? It seems to be a culmination of four things. One, it has a lot of frame-rate and graphical issues. In this case, the criticism is very warranted. Watch a ship you're in's shadow move below you and it looks absolutely horrendous. The graphics aren't pretty either. Just look at the explosions (although I do recall the explosions in the Medal of Honor reboot looking like ass). That leads into reason number two; this is the game we got after 14 years. True, Gearbox probably got the product in shambles, but it needed to be better. The game has it's problems and they're apparent. The technical issues it has shouldn't be there. Then there's reason number three: A lot of the reviewers hate on the character. This is really a matter of opinion. Duke makes me chuckle and whenever he cracked jokes at other games I took it as more of a homage. It just had to be done through Duke's personality like the "doomed space marine" comment from 3D. If the developers really hated those games than they wouldn't have taken inspiration from them. It's a loving jab, but take it how you will. The point of the character is that he's a misogynist blowhard and that's what makes it funny. It's not like he's surrounded by intelligent people. I can understand if that doesn't make you laugh, but if you laughed at Bulletstorm you can't complain about it being immature. That brings us to four, the gameplay.

Here's the thing. A lot of the reviewers say there are stretches of boring gameplay and unnecessary puzzles. But what did shooters from that era have? puzzles and platforming. DNF promised to bring that style back and it did. People were excited about it, but as soon as they played it they hated it all of a sudden. Sure, it could have been done better, but why would you complain so damn much because you have a physics puzzle to solve. It's not that big of a deal. Besides, there is plenty the game does right. The driving sections are cool, and the shrinking sections make what would otherwise be typical level design very interesting. The guns are still really cool and the shooting is well-done. It's a competent game, and competent games don't deserve threes.

The best conclusion I can come to is this. It has problems, but because it's Duke Nukem and because it's been so long, people graded the shortcomings way too harshly. You don't grade a game on what it could have been. You grade it on what it is and DNF is not a 2. It's not a 3. Hell, I think 5 is pushing it. 2's and 3's are broken and Forever is far from that. It's main problem is that it's dated, but you don't punish it that harshly. It's honestly just not fair. Like I said, I'm not giving it a score. It doesn't matter at this point. My main point is that it's a fun game with problems that doesn't deserve the crucifixion it's been given. That's my two cents. Spend them on what you will.