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Duke Nukem Forever (2001)

Armenius

Extremely [H]
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Jan 28, 2014
Messages
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Somebody was able to get their hands on the game that was showcased at E3 in 2001 and leaked it on Internet Archive. That early version of the game is highly sought after by the community, and is often wished that Gearbox would just released the damned thing for gamers to consume. Well, now we have our chance. Being a leaked unofficial release of a 20-year old build, expect to run into a lot of issues. Civvie has said he will be making a video on it. The build runs on a heavily modified Unreal Engine (1).

The forum is embedding the video on the archive link, so here it is in a code block:

Code:
https://archive.org/details/1652058670472

https://nitter.domain.glass/Civvie11/status/1524056269274898432



EDIT: Actionsack was removed from the Nitter instances. Updating link.
 
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I'm too lazy to actually download and play it myself, but I'll definitely be watching or at least half paying attention to youtube videos that show off what they had done at that time and comparing it to the 2011 version.
 
Is this actually even a playable game or is it like 3 broken as hell levels of barely working game
 
Looks like the SOF 2 Double Helix Engine graphics wise. Not bad, but characters look uninspired.
 
where do you download it?
Copy the link in the code block, then look on the right side of the screen. You want to click on the RAR link in the DOWNLOAD OPTIONS section. You can also click on SHOW ALL to download the additional files (screenshots, cpp file, videos).

1652275554770.png
 
Is this actually even a playable game or is it like 3 broken as hell levels of barely working game
It's not even an alpha. It's just a collection of levels to test gameplay features. What is there is interesting to see, at least. It plays surprisingly well on a modern PC. It will be interesting to see if the community takes the shell of what we got to make it into a complete game.
 
I think getting the source code for this is pretty cool and has historical value, since it runs on a modified / upgraded version of UE1 and Epic hasn't released Unreal / UE1's source. I wonder if it holds any prospects for people wanting to modify other UE1 games.
 
Thanks, a video like that is exactly what I was waiting for.

Too bad they didn't get their act together and put out a game. A lot of the stuff was really cool for 2001. If you want a game to gauge this against, Halo: Combat Evolved came out on Xbox in 2001.
 
I never understood why they just won't make a new DNF game or a sequal. I guess they dont want the backlash from all the politically correct and woke crowd in today's world. Which in my opinion all the more reason to make a new DN game lol.
 
I never understood why they just won't make a new DNF game or a sequal. I guess they dont want the backlash from all the politically correct and woke crowd in today's world. Which in my opinion all the more reason to make a new DN game lol.

I don't think it has anything to do with that. It's probably more that they simply just don't have any ideas for a new one or how to make Duke work now days. DNF was a complete piece of shit at every level and Duke's style of humor is just old. I don't know how you'd take mid-90's pre-teen/teen humor and make it work 26 years later, at least not from a game by a major development studio like Gearbox. A new Duke could work as an indie throwback game, something that a very creative team puts together to call back to 90s nostalgia, but it doesn't really have a place in the AAA game space. Quite frankly, I also don't think Gearbox is skilled enough to pull off a new Duke, they would absolutely have to give it to a team filled with people that grew up around that style of 90s humor and 90s culture.
 
I don't think it has anything to do with that. It's probably more that they simply just don't have any ideas for a new one or how to make Duke work now days. DNF was a complete piece of shit at every level and Duke's style of humor is just old. I don't know how you'd take mid-90's pre-teen/teen humor and make it work 26 years later, at least not from a game by a major development studio like Gearbox. A new Duke could work as an indie throwback game, something that a very creative team puts together to call back to 90s nostalgia, but it doesn't really have a place in the AAA game space. Quite frankly, I also don't think Gearbox is skilled enough to pull off a new Duke, they would absolutely have to give it to a team filled with people that grew up around that style of 90s humor and 90s culture.
Ion Fury and other similar retro FPS's recently prove that retro shooters can do well. If they gave it to some indie dev team i'm sure someone could make a decent DNF 2k1 using the material already there as a starting point.
 
Ion Fury and other similar retro FPS's recently prove that retro shooters can do well. If they gave it to some indie dev team i'm sure someone could make a decent DNF 2k1 using the material already there as a starting point.

I completely forgot about Ion Fury, but that's exactly the kind of thing I was talking about. It's just not something we would ever see from a big studio. I would love to see an indie studio take the 2K1 build and make something with it, I think that could turn into a really interesting project. Unfortunately, it's more likely that Gearbox will just let the IP sit or they'll take it and churn out another shooter with Gearbox-style humor.
 
Giving it to a indie studio could work. Gamers would play it if its fun. The DN sense of humor could work today if done properly I think. It is a game afterall and gamers as much fun as we make of them and at us know its just that a game. The naysayers would be mainly those who don't game or on the far too woke side of things which probably dont game either. Gearbox may be of the attitude of nobody but them can have the the title of ability to make the game. Thus killing the franchise for good.
 
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Ion Fury and other similar retro FPS's recently prove that retro shooters can do well. If they gave it to some indie dev team i'm sure someone could make a decent DNF 2k1 using the material already there as a starting point.
Ion Fury was dope and Phantom Fury basically looks like what DNF should have been
 
I never understood why they just won't make a new DNF game or a sequal. I guess they dont want the backlash from all the politically correct and woke crowd in today's world. Which in my opinion all the more reason to make a new DN game lol.
I think Randy is just holding onto the IP at this point to prevent anybody else from doing anything with it.
 
I think Randy is just holding onto the IP at this point to prevent anybody else from doing anything with

Sadly, that’s something a lot of companies do. There as so many great IPs languishing because publishers don’t want to revive them and yet refuse to sell them off to people that would make use of it.
 
They've continued working on this and it's now on ModDB:

https://www.moddb.com/mods/dnf2001-restoration-project

Still not a complete game by any means, but from what this guy is saying they've greatly improved the shooting feel/mechanics and it's much more fun to play now.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZejQJ25zWlw

I watched that video a couple of days ago and think this mod is such a cool little time capsule that shows players the game that generated so much hype back in the day but never surfaced. DNF eventually released in 2011 to a very lukewarm reception for several reasons, but it does make you wonder if the original vision had stayed on track without all of the changes and development hell if it would have lived up to the hype.
 
IMO the 2001 version had it actually released in 2001 would have lived up to the hype with that level of interaction and graphics. It would have sat in a special spot for a few years before Doom 3/HL2 era. That being said, I’m not sure it was feasible for that reason. A very similar game in scope/technology was cancelled because the technology just wasn’t there, and that was Amen the awakening.
 
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