Duke Nukem 3D 20th Anniversary Trailer, My Thoughts

Duke Nukem is back! Well, sort of. It's the 20th Anniversary of the game that put the alien-killing stripper-tipping beer-drinking steroid-taking machine of a man on the map: Duke Nukem 3D! While not the first game he appeared in (3D was the third game of his series), 3D is regarded as the very best, and most loved of the Duke games. And they released a trailer for it.

Yup, it's not simply going to be a port for modern consoles and PCs. It's got some new stuff in it, according to the trailer. It'll have a special new fifth episode featuring designs by one of the game's original creators, and the levels will be designed by "Levelord", who was described as a "legendary level designer." At first I thought this "Levelord" must've been a modder who made levels that became rather famous among the community, but it turns out that "Levelord" was a nickname for Richard Gray, one of the original designers of DN3D. Huh. That's neat.

The trailer also states that Jon St. John would provide new Duke Talk for the game. And Lee Jackson, the game's original composer, will provide new music for the episode, too. It's really cool that they're bringing back all these original people to be involved in this new episode. It really shows the lengths they are going to please fans and make it feel like something right out of 1996.

According to the Duke Nukem website, the new episode will involve Duke going around the world to fight aliens. His World Tour will be hitting several major locations, like Hollywood, London, and Paris. Personally, I would've also loved to have seen duke hit Tokyo, Beijing, Johannesburg, and Sydney, too. Japan would've given Duke the opportunity to fight a giant kaiju-esque alien, maybe with a DukeMech. And as for China, who would not want to see Duke fight a dragon? And the latter two, because Duke's World Tour should give Africa and Australia some love.

As for the trailer, it looks fantastic. It felt like a political ad. Appropriate, considering we are in an election year. The gameplay footage shown looked really good. It's bright and clear, and it was great to watch. I'm glad they didn't upgrade it to be dark and gritty-looking like the stereotypical modern shooter.

I have to admit, I...never played this game back in the day. Never had the chance to. Did play Doom, though. I enjoyed Doom. I wish the new Doom game was on X-Box 360.

This will be fun. I hope I can get this game on my laptop.