Come Get Some!

So yeah, 15 years in the making, was Duke Nukem Forever worth it? Yes and no. Wait most of you don’t know what Duke Nukem Forever is? Okay story time!

Duke Nukem began its life in 1991 with Apogee Software releasing a simplified side scroller, whereby a blond hero named Duke Nukem was captured by the Mad Dr Proton and had to escape and simultaneously stop his antagonist plans for world domination. Plots don’t get more silly then that. It was popular enough that a second side scrolling sequel was released in 1992, but by then Video Games were undergoing a fundamental shift. At the time a Mesquite Texas based company founded by Kansas City Native John Carmak created Wolfenstein 3D, followed by Doom. Both published about about the same time.

Seeing a chance to make a name for itself on the then emerging First Person Shooter Market, Apogee Renamed itself 3D Realms and took the plunge. After three years of development Duke Nukem 3D was released. And did it impress.

Seriously the computer gaming world had seen nothing like this, and consoles were unable to compete as well. The titular character went from a bland sprite to this over the top, chauvinistic blend of Ash Williams and Snake Pliskin. More so then anywhere else Duke Nukem 3D tread on ground no other game would, by introducing elements such as alcohol use, sexual situations and entertainment, drug use, and no holes barred foul language, Duke Nukem played to the adult market at a time when even PC gaming was seen as for children.

Immediately upon the commercial success of Duke Nukem 3D, 3D Realms announced in 1997 a sequel titled Duke Nukem Forever. Despite Seven Spin off games however during the times pan, DNF was delayed repeatedly.

The development History of the game is nothing short of Legen- Wait for it…

It got to be so bad that DNF became the butt of many jokes, to the point of being the definition of Vaporware. Such comments like Duke Nukem If Ever, Whenever, Fornever and the list goes on became standard for making fun of it. Fans even grew weary and by 2001, there was little press on developments as 3D Realms shuttered itself and simply said it would hit the streets “when it’s done.” In that time-span fans largely forgot about the game though some remembered, and compiled a list of things that happened since Duke Nukem Forever was announced.

When it was finally announced that 3D Realms had fired the Duke Nukem Development Team and was undergoing financial restructuring, Forever finally seemed all but dead, despite the teaser released earlier in 2007.

But then again…. There ain’t no rest for the wicked.

We will finish the History Lesson and get to the review next time.

Some things Just do not need to be...

WHY GOD WHY!!!!!

Look, here is the thing, I am a Halo fan. I was first exposed to Halo combat evolved when my brother and I simultaneously split with our respective girlfriends and in a huge bout of male sympathy, I had my first beer with my dad, we went out for burgers and ended up buying a Microsoft X Box and half of its launch library. Halo was the only thing that stood out. While its level design was not very impressive, it did a lot of things to the First Person Shooter (which I was still calling Doom Clones) that were impressive. A regenerating health bar, the ability to only carry two weapons, use of grenades as an action instead of a separate weapon. Halo took a lot of ideas from various other shooters and melded them into a perfect experience.

Halo as a fictional universe has a core trilogy, surrounded two (later three) main characters on a quest to save the galaxy from Religious arrogance, I mean space bugs. It was rich in allusions to Biblical, Torranic, and Islamic scripture. It also had elements of Greek myths, Chinese fables, and even King Arthur, particularly the ending of the core Trilogy.

RIGHT THERE! The hero who saved the world is presumed dead from his crusade, and is being escorted by the Lady of the Lake to sanctuary until he is needed again. Bang! Fineto! Done! story is closed, yes there was allusion to further tales, but really we did not need them. If the Halo Universe was to survive, it should have done so upon its own merits rather then trying to artificially drag out a long gone protagonist’s story.

And you know what pisses me off more then anything else. I am going to buy it! I am going to play it! And I will probably enjoy it despite the inevitable glaring faults.

Video Games ARE Art!!!

So last month the National Endowment for Arts declared that Video Games are considered an art-form, and therefore are open to federal funding for development, the same way television, film, theater, and literature are occasionally granted pitiful grants that keep the people working on those projects fed for a month.

Run on sentence lead-ins aside, we now have exhibits from talented developers on video games great and small on display in the Smithsonian. This project from what I hear was in development for the past five years, and continuously updated till its debut this year. So next to your Leonardo, Donatello, Michelangelo, Raphael, and the Shredder will be the works of Shigeru Miyamoto (of Mario Brothers fame).

This is unequivocally a good thing. One only needs to go onto YouTube and search for “Halo 3 VidDoc” too see the tireless effort that artists go into drawing on paper, then creating real life models of before finally rendering onto screen their works to be the Master Chief we love to send out into Alien Kickassia on weekends.

Wow I am abusing grammatically correct run on sentences today…

Of course it did not take much time for the controversy engine to stir up whether this new declaration had Merit. Credit has to go to Fox news for presenting our subject matter in not only the wrong light, but an incredibly biased light. You can either watch this video or if you want a smart ass comic that tells the same story you can look at this.

The Video specifically mentions the Call of Duty Series, and it possibly getting federal funding. Call of Duty, for the uninitiated is a video game that places you in the perspective of a solider (usually British or American) fighting wars. Initially the game was set in World War II, but eventually evolved into more modern scenarios. As I mentioned above the argument postulated by Fox is that should such a game be entitled to N.E.A. funding.

I agree with Fox, it does not. I also agree with Activision, it does not. I agree with numerous gaming websites and magazines, who all agree with Fox. There is no need for a Triple A studio blockbuster of a Video Game to receive any federal funding to ensure its release. It is a good thing that is not what the NEA is interested in.

To give Activision federal grant money to release a Call of Duty game (which despite my criticisms does have some artistic merits) would be the equivalent of the NEA giving James Cameron money to make Avatar. No one would deny the artistic merit of the film, but it was doing fine on its own, being funded by one of Hollywood’s powerhouses, and a major studio.

The NEA would be more interested in providing funding for a game like Minecraft, Braid, Limbo or Amnesia: The Dark Descent. Google each one of them, or YouTube some game footage and you will see what I mean. These are engines of creativity that even despite every one of them being a roaring success never got enough credit.

Of course major media outlets don’t care. They call up IGN and ask “what were the top 5 selling games of the past year?” Then of course they are treated to four First Person Shooters and Grand Turismo and show clips of those while they ask game developers “IS THIS ART!” And they might as well do it in German accents for all the choice any relatively reasonable media critic or games industry insider has.

The key thing is that we have across the world what is Commercial Art, and what is Fine Art. You never see and advertising agency putting up their projects for Kellogg’s up for federal funding. Likewise BioWare will not be trying to get the Feds to fund the last quarter of Mass Effect 3. Even controversial art-house games would be subject to federal scrutiny, and cynical attempts to garner attention like the so called “School Shooter Mod” would be rejected immediately. (if you want to see an art-house style game covering school shootings I highly recommend Super Columbine Massacre by the way. The creator actually makes a significant attempt to explore the psyche of the Columbine Shooters.)

History is on the side of Games however. We have schools at major universities devoted to animating assets for video games. There are more man hours spent rendering every curve and angle of Miranda Lawson’s arse then in any one Rembrandt painting.

The major Pushback against Video games entering the mainstream has to do with one very key item. Video games are still by and large regarded as toys for children. Much in the same way that Radio was regarded as a tool, and film a meaningless novelty, the origins of Video games from the days of the Magnivox Oddessey and Atari 2600 has permitted a generation of journalists and political leaders to have a clear waypoint to try and keep games “in their place.”

Where the moment in games is that the proverbial “chains” were broken and Video games managed to break free of being merely children’s toys, I can not point to. Some say as early as February 12^th of 1991 with the release of Super Mario Brothers 3, one of the most critically acclaimed video games ever. Others would cite Final Fantasy VII or Halo: Combat Evolved.

But the chain has been broken, game designers are no longer toymakers, and players, as has been shown by statistical analysis time and again are not just children. Games are no longer approaching mere entertainment, but instead ask the player to consider moral quandaries and balance out the consequences of their actions. Whole avenues of entertainment have sprung up around gamer culture. To say that it is only a matter of time shows that people have not been paying attention, as now we merely have to wait for the stubbon holdouts to die.