Video games - Duke Nukem 3D

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	Video games - Duke Nukem 3D

Duke Nukem 3D is a first-person shooter developed by 3D Realms and released on January 29 1996 by Apogee Software, featuring the adventures of Duke Nukem, based on a character that had appeared in earlier platform games by the company: Duke Nukem and Duke Nukem II
.

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 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.

Humor

Duke Nukem 3D is mainly notable for the often crude humor it introduced into what had previously been a fairly humorless genre, including a stream of one-liners (heavily inspired by Ash Williams and John Nada) from the title character. Many of these related to the frequently gruesome deaths meted out by the Duke ("That's gotta hurt"), interactions with useable props such as toilets ("Ahhh, much better") or noteworthy things Duke comes across and feels necessary to comment on, like Duke Nukem arcade machines ("Hmm... don't have time to play with myself."). Various Easter eggs appear in the game, such as a giant sign on a wall proclaiming "NOONE SHOULD BE HERE" in an area not accessible except by using a no-clip cheat.

The game also references and spoofs many films and other games. For instance, when the player comes upon a corpse that closely resembles the player character in Doom
, Duke comments, "That's one doomed space marine." This quote became famous after websites dedicated to Duke Nukem 3D began reporting that Doom's developer, id Software, had filed a lawsuit against Apogee Games and 3D Realms, trying to obtain an injunction to remove it. (The suit was ultimately unsuccessful.) Another jab at a fellow shooter game was a line in a level in Episode 3 when a building (with a sticker warning of a fault line) blows up and partially collapses; Duke responds, "I ain't afraid of no quake", obviously poking fun at the game Quake
, which was yet to be released. The game freely plunders many themes from cinematic sources, notably the Alien (the proto-slimes come out of eggs exactly like those seen in the Alien series and people trapped in pods who whisper "kill me" like in Aliens and one deleted scene from Alien) and Evil Dead film series. There are also cameos from Indiana Jones (a dead Indy hanging in a cave that collapses), Star Trek: The Next Generation (a hidden recreation of the Enterprise bridge), Star Wars (the hanging corpse of Luke Skywalker in Stormtrooper armor), Escape From L.A. (the corpse of the movie's lead character, Snake, on a pike, with Duke saying, "I guess he didn't escape from LA."), The Hunt for Red October (the submarine USS Dallas in Episode 1, Level 3), 2001: A Space Odyssey and The Terminator (where we see a crushed Terminator like at the end of the first movie). In the Atomic Edition, the game contains references to Dirty Harry, Die Hard, Mission: Impossible, and Independence Day.

There are also references to the OJ Simpson trial, including the chase of the white Ford Bronco being played on TV in the red light district bar as well as billboards simply saying Innocent? and Guilty!.

Gameplay

Level design

A notable quality of the game is the immense interactivity and realism of its levels. While many past first-person shooter games like Doom take place within relatively confined corridors, usually in gloomy, claustrophobic bases, the levels of Duke Nukem 3D take the player through attractively 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. As well as being highly detailed (for the time), 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, infamously, strippers). While these rarely have a crucial role in play (the closed-circuit cameras being a tactical exception), they give Duke Nukem 3D an immersive feel greater than that in its rivals. As previously indicated, they also usually added considerably to its humor.

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Duke Nukem 3D ]

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