duke nukem forever Subsequently, the game itself is perhaps more aware of this oft-uninformed and overblown pressure-cooker environment than it really needs to be. The first hour or so of gameplay is so full of wry self-reference that by the time Duke is confronted with a stubborn door and quips, “Keycard? I don’t need no f$%#!n’ keycard!” before wrenching the thing open, you almost want to dive in and tell the man: “Okay. We get it. It’s been a long time since this was first announced in 1997. Can we just get on with blowing shit up now?”
Oddly, it takes ages before you get to properly blow the crap out of everything. Whereas DN3D gave you a pistol and pipe-bombs at the rooftop outset, DNF is content to let you stumble around through sluggish exposition and hollow fan-service with only your fists for the better part of an hour, after which you eventually acquire the alien AT laser. It’s a dismally unsatisfying weapon, and you’re stuck with it until you abruptly end up suffering from entire-body shrinkage, at which point it’s time to engage in the first of Gearbox’s hopelessly awful new R/C car sections. Later you discover that this served merely as an excuse to artificially extend the level, with Duke having to trek his way back over the mini-miles travelled once he’s returned to full size.
It’s not exactly an auspicious beginning, and DNF is riddled with questionable gameplay design throughout its first act and beyond (although it does improve when things heat up, if only by virtue of introducing more action), the most telling of which is the Duke statue puzzle you’re tasked with navigating early on. It’s the first time you’ll realise just how slippery and imprecise the controls are, and how much they don’t lend themselves to the uneven amount of joyless puzzle-solving present in the game. The puzzle in question isn’t too hard to figure out and you know where you need to jump to get through it, but you’ll end up repeating it a zillion times simply because Duke handles like a drunk pony.
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