I'm sure you have heard the phrase "Duke Nukem: Forever is the worst video game ever made" plenty of times...

I'll be honest with you, It's not a ground breaking game. it is by no means "bad" however.

People were very let down with this game because they believed the game they would be playing was a build that was in development for 12 years which is understandable, i suppose; surely a game that was in development for 12 would naturally be the biggest and best video game of all time past, present and future; This game however was not in development for 12 years; It was in development heck. There is a long story here about the history of this game and it's practically a miracle anything was ever completed. I won't go into too much detail and I'll try not to digress too much I did however want to get that out of the way.

This game plays a good bit like the original "Prey" (the 2006 one) or Bulletstorm. The levels are mostly linear (aka get from point A to point B and shoot everything in between) and there is a little bit of baby teir puzzle solving on some levels.

In terms of art design and dialogue this is very much the Duke Nukem you know and love however gameplay was heavily influenced by other FPS games from the era; for example you have regenerating health like in Call of Duty or Halo (a feature most fans did not like) but there are also some good things from the era, that many people overlook, like melee and grenades not having to be "equipped" via the number pad as one would have had to do in 1999.

The graphics are pretty decent for the time except for the gore, there is not alot of it when you compare the game to its competitors or its predecessors.

Music is pretty underwhelming, The awesome "electo-metal" doom-esq music from DN3D is gone. I can't recall what the music was like on the third person PS1 Duke Nukem games, perhaps they were inspired by that.

The Story is acceptable but your not really ment to play it for the story necessarily (and I think you know that) I would like to point out that they continued the trend of making allmost every scene in this game a parody or commentary about some pop-culture of the time, if I'm not explaining that well enough think about how the borderlands games do humor and you should catch my drift.

My biggest complaint is that Duke seems to have only a few dozen voice lines; As you likely know the best thing about Duke Nukem, aside from the fast paced, bloody action is his witty oneliners. you are very likely to hear all of the voice overs before you make it halfway through the game.

Overall I think this game is worth playing, I would advise getting it on sale as the game is probbaly only about 10 hours long and the DLC (which is way funnier) is only like four.

You really do owe it to your self to play this iconic piece of video game history.




TL;DR if you liked Prey 2006 and Duke Nukem 3D you will find this game on the better side of mediocre