Duke Nukem 3D

by GT Interactive

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B00002S6EL
• Item Weight: 5 ounces
• Media: CD-ROM
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (29 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #26,912 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

He's tanned. He's rested. He's on steroids. And he's mad! His vacation was just interrupted by more alien invaders. Finish them off once and for all and battle the queen alien boss in this better-than-Duke Atomic Edition. It's complete with aliens, strippers, steroids, adult language, humor, and violence.

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Sure, it's crude. Sure, it could be called sexist, and sure, a good part of it seems designed by socially backward fourteen-year-old boys. Still, once you get past a few distasteful points (such as Duke's steroid-induced buffness), Duke Nukem 3D offers a fast-paced respite from the DOOM-and-gloom tone of most first-person shooters on the market. It's hard to hold a grudge against someone who grumbles, "It's time to kick ass and chew gum, and I'm all out of gum."

Is there a plot? Not really - there's just a premise, and one so thin that it might not even be pitchable to a Hollywood producer. Seems a bunch of aliens have descended on Earth to "steal our chicks," as Duke so delicately puts it. It's up to you, as Duke, to save the day by, basically, shooting everything that moves and a few things that don't.

Anyone familiar with this genre of games will be instantly at home. In between killing aliens, you have to collect security cards (think keys from DOOM), which allow you access to various parts of a level. You finish a level by making it to the Self-Destruct button (how you can win by blowing yourself up is beyond us, but hey, Duke works in mysterious ways). There are some puzzle elements to each level, but none too tough for one who's made it through Marathon.

Speaking of Marathon: inevitably, comparisons will be made. Build, the graphics engine behind Duke Nukem 3D, is still a "2 1/2-D" construct - not truly 3D. However, it does allow more 3D-like effects than the Marathon engine, such as crouching, jumping, ramps, and multistory buildings. There's even a submarine you can board, and a subway car. Also, Duke's world is far more interactive than Marathon's. Phones have dial tones, vases shatter in a cross-fire, windows break, and when you come across a pool table you can roll the balls around.

Still, there are some areas in which the Marathon series retains an edge. Swimming and flying in Duke Nukem 3D is downright boring: You move up or down, and stay in one place without bobbing or sinking. There's also no mystery at all in Duke Nukem 3D. Shoot, watch the gore, run on. The ingenuity of some levels, and some honestly funny parts (besides the alien on the toilet, I mean) do entice you to play on, but there's little to go back to and try to understand. Then again, nobody's selling this game as a replacement for graduate studies. And, make no mistake, Duke is fun.

MacSoft and Lion are to be congratulated for the quality of this port from the PC world. Installation was a breeze, and Mac interface conventions (such as selecting menu items with the mouse, dialog boxes, and menu bars) are all there. But wait - there's more: The Mac version of Duke Nukem 3D offers more value and more features than the PC version did. You get levels that PC users had to purchase separately as the Plutonium Pack, including a great level set in a fast-food joint. Also, "MacDuke" takes advantage of some of the Mac's multimedia features, allowing you to switch screen resolutions on the fly (I know you can already do that, but PC users can't) and record taunts in your own voice for multiplayer games. One tech tip: If you find that the game suffers from occasional momentary freezes, try turning off the Music option - the freezes are most likely caused by the computer accessing the CD-ROM music tracks.

Speaking of multiplayer games: Duke Nukem 3D's Dukematch features are impressive. Not only can you play over a local network, you can play against one to seven enemies over IPX, AppleTalk, or TCP/IP. Head-to-head play over the Internet required only getting a competitor's IP address and typing it in to a dialog box. With a 28.8kbps modem, play was smooth and almost as good as over a local network. Duke Nukem 3D is even cross-platform networkable, so you can go kick some PC user's behind, whether locally, or across the world. One warning: unlike Marathon, Duke Nukem 3D won't send a map to all the players, so if you plan to use a third-party map, you'll have to email it to all your friends (the good news is that Duke map files work on both platforms with no modifications necessary and there are a ton of gamer-made maps available on the Web).

For parents, there's a password-protected "Parental Lock" option (in the Options menu, or course). Once you set this lock, your kids will be protected from some of the more explicit violence and "adult themes" in Duke Nukem 3D. Then they will be free to run around and shoot things to their little hearts' delight.

Speed was excellent (16-28 frames per second on a 800-x-600-pixel resolution) on a Power Mac 7600/120. On a 68040-based Mac, you'll need to reduce screen size and detail, but the game is still playable. Overall, the Mac version of Duke Nukem 3D is an impressive achievement technically, and, though you might feel guilty enjoying it so much, you probably will. - D. D. Turner

Good News: Fast action game with a specific sense of humor. Great weapon variety. Good network play. Excellent port.

Bad News: Possibly offensive sense of humor. Chunky graphics. Must have CD in drive to play.

Rating:3/4

©1999 MacAddict

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars As far as shooter games go..., December 15, 1999

By 

Matt Swindle (Dallas) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Duke Nukem 3D (CD-ROM)

Duke Nukem, while nothing more than a mindless shoot'em-up, is perhaps the best of its kind. It has a very fast engine! It runs very smoothly even on my relatively old computer and using the full screen. The scenery is more realistic than the dungeons of Quake and Unreal. Instead, you're fighting in the city with grovery stores, subways, sewers, and the occassional nuclear facility.

The foul language, sexual induendo, and rude comments can be funny, but for those concerned about young minds, you can turn it off and keep it off with a password. The surround sound effects are engaging, especially if you have a good set of stereo speakers or headphones.

The game also has the capability of multi=player gaming with computer-controlled players, but they are very fast. It is supposed to be useful for testing user-created maps, but they can prevent a real challenge.

The Duke gets my endorsement, especially for the speed, sound, and real-world setting.

12 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Action-Packed Wanton Violence, a GREAT Time!, July 21, 2004

By 

J. Reynolds (Houston, TX United States) - See all my reviews

= Fun:5.0 out of 5 stars 

This review is from: Duke Nukem 3D (CD-ROM)

Our man Duke is back again, confronting aliens with an array of hand-wielded weapons, fighting his way to the next level. The gratuitous violence is extremely cathartic, especially if you've had to deal with a lawyer anytime within the past 12 hours. An interesting aspect is that whenever Duke lands in one of these many scenarios, he immediately becomes a target for attack. There's an alien waiting there, simply to kill Duke, and that alien will do so if Duke does nothing. It it completely irrational, the way these aliens attack. I attempted to use the Duke character in a more tolerant way -- I envisioned him asking about the aliens, "Why do they hate me?" I looked for an option wherein Duke could form a coalition involving the United Nations, and dispatch inspectors -- and if that proved ineffective, give the inspectors more time. (Nothing will deter an alien from killing you like being faced with an inspector who has been given more time!) I worked with the controls to make Duke more sensitive, tolerant and diverse... but the aliens simply killed him. It turned out that Duke would always get killed if he did nothing, if he did anything other than kill the aliens first. It appears that when an alien is determined to kill you, then the only intelligent action in the world is to kill him first, and keep your own life and future intact. I bet I know who Duke Nuken votes for.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not the same old "Doom", January 26, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Duke Nukem 3D (CD-ROM)

Too many first person shooters are essentially a throwback to the earliest days of computer games: a maze of twisty passages, all alike.

But Duke inhabits if not the real world, at least something recognizable as a world. There are light switches and elevators and (with the add-on disk) burger drive-throughs and, yes, lots of half-naked women. And it's all interactive.

Sure, some of it's goofy (interactive toilets are probably fairly pointless), but it makes for a great game: Wandering into the darkened men's room, you can see in the mirror that an alien's waiting to ambush you by the sink. Toss in a pipe bomb and step back and trigger it.

One of the all-time great games, and I can't wait for the sequel, "Duke Nukem Forever."