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Duke Nukem Forever: barely playable, not funny, rampantly offensive

arstechnica.com

61–70 of 78 posts

Re: Duke Nukem Forever: barely playable, not funny, rampantly offensive

#61
post #60

I found the review persuasive. The points about misogyny resonated with me, but everything he criticized about the gameplay resonated as well. Linear gameplay with cutscenes, bleah. Regenerating health, meh, not in this kind of game. You can only carry two guns and they aren't fun to shoot -- what are they THINKING? This is DUKE. I don't know what era they grew up in, but my action heroes can carry at least six guns,…

Please, create this game, I will buy it. You had me at the assless chaps gun.

Re: Duke Nukem Forever: barely playable, not funny, rampantly offensive

#62
I've been watching a playthrough of Duke Nukem Forever (because I don't want to play the actual game). Firstly, it looks really, really fun. Not smart, not something that I would play through multiple times, even if I did play it - it doesn't compare to Fallout 3 in the least - but fun, in the same way that watching a mindless action movie can be fun. Secondly, picking up feces from the toilet is entirely optional, and reflects upon the reviewer as well as the game. One of the major selling points of the game was that everything can be interacted with, so what did you expect?

Re: Duke Nukem Forever: barely playable, not funny, rampantly offensive

#63
post #60

I found the review persuasive. The points about misogyny resonated with me, but everything he criticized about the gameplay resonated as well. Linear gameplay with cutscenes, bleah. Regenerating health, meh, not in this kind of game. You can only carry two guns and they aren't fun to shoot -- what are they THINKING? This is DUKE. I don't know what era they grew up in, but my action heroes can carry at least six guns,…

I just bought this game thinking I'd give it a chance, knowing not to expect a polished title like the Modern Warfare iterations of Call of Duty... but after reading the review and your comment, how could they get that so so wrong? Exploring the maps was half the fun, but if they just made them all be linear successions of duck and cover / shoot from chest-high walls... no thanks. Duke was all about taking bullets to the face till you were almost a bloody pulp and then drinking your health back to 100% from a fire hydrant that you busted open with a rocket launcher.

Thankfully, I still have my receipt and will probably return it this afternoon. I'll get the PC demo or borrow it from a friend in the future.

Re: Duke Nukem Forever: barely playable, not funny, rampantly offensive

#64
post #60

I found the review persuasive. The points about misogyny resonated with me, but everything he criticized about the gameplay resonated as well. Linear gameplay with cutscenes, bleah. Regenerating health, meh, not in this kind of game. You can only carry two guns and they aren't fun to shoot -- what are they THINKING? This is DUKE. I don't know what era they grew up in, but my action heroes can carry at least six guns,…

I just bought this game thinking I'd give it a chance, knowing not to expect a polished title like the Modern Warfare iterations of Call of Duty... but after reading the review and your comment, how could they get that so so wrong? Exploring the maps was half the fun, but if they just made them all be linear successions of duck and cover / shoot from chest-high walls... no thanks. Duke was all about taking bullets to…

You just bought it and you aren't even going to play it?

But why?

Re: Duke Nukem Forever: barely playable, not funny, rampantly offensive

#65
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I just bought this game thinking I'd give it a chance, knowing not to expect a polished title like the Modern Warfare iterations of Call of Duty... but after reading the review and your comment, how could they get that so so wrong? Exploring the maps was half the fun, but if they just made them all be linear successions of duck and cover / shoot from chest-high walls... no thanks. Duke was all about taking bullets to…

You just bought it and you aren't even going to play it? But why?

I was on the fence about it for awhile before reading the review, but this morning I decided to pick it up due to a tight schedule during the day(had to get there just as the store opened before work) and fear of the game being sold out if I wanted to play it. It's not the most sound logic, I will admit :)

Re: Duke Nukem Forever: barely playable, not funny, rampantly offensive

#66
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What gives me the impression of "humourlessness" is that he condemns jokes based on what they're about rather than whether they're funny. For instance, he tells us that Duke blows up some pregnant women and then makes a joke about abortion. And I agree, that's pretty darn offensive. But is it funny? We don't know, the reviewer doesn't tell us the punchline. I've watched a couple of videos and it looks like there's a…

Maybe I don't 'Get' this game either, but the examples he cites just don't sound funny. The label on a carton of cigarettes is 'faggs'? That's not funny, it's not original, and it's not creative. Sure, that is an offensive word, but that's not my problem with it. I was practically in tears laughing at a Tosh.0 skit the other night that was basically a 5 minute long gay joke. But it was witty and original. Just saying…

Have you played it?

Re: Duke Nukem Forever: barely playable, not funny, rampantly offensive

#67
post #2

Its hard to trust a humorless judgement of humor. While I haven't played the game myself, I'd like to point out to the author of the article that if attempting to describe why a something isn't funny, the best weapon in your arsenal would be humor, not simply sticking up your nose in disgust (though one could mix that in). That said, a lot of the jokes in the game sound pretty straightforwardly shitty and weird. Howe…

I'd suggest you play the demo before sticking with how you're describing the article. I'm a fan of nearly all types of comedy and don't mind the mindless, 'tasteless' humor types. That said, the demo was tasteless AND unfunny. Considering Gearbox and 2K's recent track record, it's not too surprising -- they've been relatively mediocre at best lately.

Considering Gearbox and 2K's recent track record, it's not too surprising -- they've been relatively mediocre at best lately

I thought Borderlands was fantastic. It can be a grind at times, but it's a really well done FPS-as-RPG. The four-player co-op was icing on the cake.

Re: Duke Nukem Forever: barely playable, not funny, rampantly offensive

#68
post #60

I found the review persuasive. The points about misogyny resonated with me, but everything he criticized about the gameplay resonated as well. Linear gameplay with cutscenes, bleah. Regenerating health, meh, not in this kind of game. You can only carry two guns and they aren't fun to shoot -- what are they THINKING? This is DUKE. I don't know what era they grew up in, but my action heroes can carry at least six guns,…

Please, create this game, I will buy it. You had me at the assless chaps gun.

Was it only Quake that had such extensive modding capabilities, or was it Duke also?

In short, if they stick to the spirit of games from that time, then user content will show up and you'll both get your wish.

Re: Duke Nukem Forever: barely playable, not funny, rampantly offensive

#69
Talking about the joy of exploring the levels, I remember when I first discovered the hidden room in the first level in DN3D with the jetpack. A JETPACK! How awesome and novel was that in 1995??

And to think the game was not even true 3D! (You could aim straight ahead, shoot and hit your friend that was flying in the air). Despite that technical shortcoming, the game was FUN. I wasted many hours during summer in 1995 playing this game with a friend, and we even made our own levels to play in deathmatch, figured out novel ways to place laser tripmines, and used teleporters for nefarious purposes. Sounds like a classic case of "we made it 'cause we can" not because it was fun.

Re: Duke Nukem Forever: barely playable, not funny, rampantly offensive

#70
post #2

Its hard to trust a humorless judgement of humor. While I haven't played the game myself, I'd like to point out to the author of the article that if attempting to describe why a something isn't funny, the best weapon in your arsenal would be humor, not simply sticking up your nose in disgust (though one could mix that in). That said, a lot of the jokes in the game sound pretty straightforwardly shitty and weird. Howe…

There's a difference between witty but offensive, and just offensive for offensive sake. Just being offensive is juvenile humor, and isn't all that funny. I can watch some comedians stand on stage and say a bunch of things that make me think, 'I can't believe he just said that', but I'll be laughing the entire time. Or I can watch a movie that just plays one poop joke after another and not laugh once. His review soun…

Well said. Matt Stone and Trey Parker have mastered this offensive-yet-witty thing (this last season of South Park, notwithstanding). They should've taken a cue from those two on how to put together the humor.
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