Duke Nukem 3D

First published in GRIND II, pages 4–7.

Strikes Back) and an entire map that brings to mind the Enterprise from Star Trek.

And after Duke returns to Earth to face the alien invasion, he'll find himself in the middle of a karaoke scene where he can sing Born to be Wild, he'll be able to demolish a replica of the id Software office building, he'll spot a crushed T-800 Terminator, and he'll flee from a giant boulder just like Indiana Jones.

My list of references isn't complete. In fact, it doesn't even cover half of the cultural symbols that can be picked out across the levels of Duke Nukem 3D. What's more, beyond the homage to American culture, there's a game here you can enjoy without understanding any of the context. You don't need to know who O.J. Simpson was, and you don't need to have sat through Stanley Kubrick's cinematic masterpieces to splatter a good chunk of your screen with space-boar blood. But if you're familiar with the cultural elements on show, your satisfaction will be that much greater.

To characterise Duke Nukem 3D through a single strip-club scene and a handful of girls scattered across a few levels strikes me as a crime against art.

With or without political correctness, Duke3D.exe is a file worth opening on any system. And even if it isn't discussed in the media, the game manages to refine the past (DOOM, Hexen) and anticipate the future (Half-Life, Quake).

The programmers and designers at 3D Realms never got the same appreciation as John Carmack, John Romero and Gabe Newell. So I'll take the opportunity to thank Todd Replogle (programmer), Allen H. Blum III and Richard Gray (designers), and Lee Jackson and Robert Prince (the soundtrack composers). They did impeccable work, which ended up being misunderstood and mischaracterised.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got arses to tan and I'm all out of chewing gum… or something like that. NUKEM

DUKE

NUKEM

Get outta here with your In the roughly 20 hours I spent with Duke Nukem 3D (moments immortalised in episodes 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9 and 10 of the Nintendo Vlad series on YouTube), the controversial scenes that mark the franchise's cultural legacy (here I'm strictly referring to the accusations of masculine toxicity) lasted about 15 minutes. What is 15 out of 1,200? About 1.25%. Because for the rest I got intense action and an unexpectedly large number of puzzles that often woke my neurons up and had me experimenting.

What I want to add before I wrap up the article is that Duke Nukem 3D is a kind of Forrest Gump of games. Across the three canonical episodes, you'll find cultural and historical references through which Duke's universe tackles your Americanisms! popular phenomena from the mid-1990s. In the levels of the first episode you'll find a poster that brings to mind Men in Black and The Blues Brothers, a magazine flung on the floor that parodies Playboy, a television showing O.J. Simpson running from the police, a hanged monk from Rise of the Triad, one DOOM guy torn in half (“one DOOMed space marine”), the prison-cell poster that leads to a secret tunnel (just like Andy Dufresne's cell in The Shawshank Redemption), and the USS Dallas submarine from The Hunt for Red October.

Once Duke Nukem reaches space in episode two, far more sci-fi references can be found: the monolith from Stanley Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey, Luke Skywalker hanging upside down just as in Episode 5 (The Empire

DUKE-LIFE When I started playing Duke Nukem 3D I had two preconceptions in mind: that I was dealing with a DOOM clone, and that I was about to discover the kind of game no studio would dare to make today.

Both are wrong. Because once you strip away the things that generate sensationalism, you discover an ambitious, eclectic shooter. A genuine action title that manages to test both the player's reflexes and their intelligence.

I found in Duke Nukem 3D (the version ported to the Nintendo Switch in 2020) the missing link between DOOM and Half-Life: two of the most important titles in the history of interactive digital art. Unlike DOOM, the level design is much more vertical and lets you explore every corner of a level through jumps and an equipped jetpack. What's more, you're given the ability to aim on the Y-axis. Secret rooms and hiding places are taken to the next level too. In fact, the level of detail in Duke3D could put plenty of contemporary releases to shame.

But let's talk about the Half-Life comparison too. Exploring sewer pipes and ventilation shafts? Check. Puzzles that involve using the laws of physics? Check. Non-linear movement through several environments (including underwater levels)? Check.

Driving vehicles? Diximus! On top of the game Valve released two years later, Duke Nukem also introduces a laser beam that enlarges or shrinks characters. So you can use the device as a trap for enemies, crushing them under your boot to save bullets, or you can shrink Duke down to the size of a mouse to help the beefcake hunt out the secrets hidden in every corner of the map.

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VLAD COSTEA I

ndependent of whether we're talking about games-industry journalism or televised sensationalism, the main idea handed down to us about Duke's debut in the FPS era is that we're dealing with a parody of Stallone and Schwarzenegger action films. A vulgar hero even today, from a vanished age. A beefy cigar-smoking reciter of maxims pitched at the same depth as the pervert from Târgu Ocna. An absolute expression of the masculine toxicity the media is trying to stamp out and, as characterised, proof of crass misogyny towards DUKE's poor sex workers who move their lascivious pixels the wrong way.