Wired article on why Duke Nukem Forever failed...

[ViviTheMage]

Am I the only one who thinks Take Two will get it, and develop it?!

LONG read, but very worth it, to see what happened.

 

[Genx87]

One thing about this debacle. I feel for the developers who sound like they were underpaid and now have to put on their resumes they worked for the biggest example of how not to develope a game.

 

[Genx87]

Am I the only one who thinks Take Two will get it, and develop it?!

LONG read, but very worth it, to see what happened.

It will be itneresting to see how it plays out.

 

[Gunbuster]

Forgot to mention that group picture, Wow. Sausage Party X9000. I wonder if a woman ever set foot in that place the whole 12 years. I bet it was a socially dysfunctional nerd disaster inside.

 

[Maximilian]

He shouldve just taken all the additions and new engine ideas after the quake II/unreal engine came about and put them in a "Duke nukem forever II" pile for the next game over, doing the same during that theoretical games development. Fans have fun, devs and publishers get money and experience, everyones a winner. Anything over 5 years in development that isnt a blizzard game is just crazy.

 

[T9D]

...

 

[thegimp03]

It's too bad someone never bought out 3dr and fired Broussard. From the sounds of it, he seems like a total douche with a huge ego. From the looks of him in that picture, I bet the only times he ever got laid was when he paid for it.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

It's too bad someone never bought out 3dr and fired Broussard. From the sounds of it, he seems like a total douche with a huge ego. From the looks of him in that picture, I bet the only times he ever got laid was when he paid for it.

He still sounds like a total douche, judging from his Twitter and the number of times he keeps pushing Duke 3D in his posts:

http://twitter.com/Georgeb3dr

He must get a royalty or something.

 

[Kyanzes]

They never freaking had a deadline. OMG. And these guys had the resources to spend tens of millions of dollars. Terrible.

If nothing else, they should have freaing learned from Valve in 2004. They could have released DNF in parts.

I'm astonished over this failure.

Well, there are the types that keep postponing delivery and there are those types who land on the freaking Moon. Surely, those guys could have spent yet another ten years over the blueprints of the rocket and the Lunar lander but someone somewhere made the decision to step onward.

I hope it comes out. If nothing else, I'm curious what have they managed to put together during those years. Surely the ideas kept accumulating.

 

[ScorcherDarkly]

That was a good read, thanks for posting. I remember playing the demo for Duke Nukem 3D a TON (my parents wouldn't let me buy the full version after they saw the demo, lol). I got to know those first 3-4 levels rather well.

 

[shortylickens]

Good read. I read a similar article several months ago.

It's too bad, really. But that's why management is key in any project. Good management can often still bring something positive from a bad (or under-qualified) development team, and bad management can completely destroy the efforts of a golden workforce.

This is a lesson I learned a long time ago in the Navy. The lesson was reinforced frequently at my factory job and my depot job.


EDIT: DAMN!
I figured there was some crazy shit going on over there at 3D Realms. But that was insane. Its like they were trying to not get the game out.
Kinda sad.
If they had just released a halfway decent game in 2001, they would have had a buttload more money, could have hired a bunch more people, and been working on Duke Nukem 5 a long time ago.

 

[mmntech]

Good article. Read it yesterday. Unfortunately, this is what happens when you run into a project without a plan. I've seen it happen a lot.

DNF is dead, I don't think the project will ever be resurrected. I think it's just been too much of a nightmare and Take Two is all out of bubblegum. The character will probably live on though in some other game.

 

[mindcycle]

Take Two definitely wants the rights to the franchise so they can pump out a bunch of mediocre titles for the PSP or whatever other hand held is popular at the moment. It's too bad 3DR couldn't get their shit together and just finish the damn thing. Would have saved them from the whole mess that it is now.

 

[sanzen07]

Forgot to mention that group picture, Wow. Sausage Party X9000. I wonder if a woman ever set foot in that place the whole 12 years. I bet it was a socially dysfunctional nerd disaster inside.

Okay Mr. 5114 posts.

That said, the article was a good read. I finally understand what was going on all that time. It really shows how little common sense that man has.

 

[LumbergTech]

the man dreamed a dream and failed..i dont see any reason to fling so much shit at him...maybe he had mental problems with prevented him from making fully rational decisons....nonetheless he still created one of the most innovative games of a time.

 

[TheWart]

Just as an FYI, saw this at slashdot:

Someone posted a link to the WIRED story yesterday and one of the responses was from Jason Bergman [shacknews.com] who worked for Shacknews at one point as a writer and later moved on to Take Two and now works for Bethesda. In the discussion he posted [shacknews.com]:

That article is missing a LOT of facts. Until the lawsuit is settled, you won't know the full story.

Which naturally got the "Well how could you even know?" response, to which he responded [shacknews.com]:

I was the producer at take two on dnf. So yes. Yes I know the real story. This article has a few things that are blatantly false, and others that are assumptions from people who weren't there.

Granted this is from someone who used to work at Take Two, which is the company somewhat demonized in the article, so there may be some bias in play there, but it sounds like some of the stuff in this article may just be flat wrong.

Guess they can at least turn the mess into a movie....paging Uwe Boll!

 

[shortylickens]

the man dreamed a dream and failed..i dont see any reason to fling so much shit at him...maybe he had mental problems with prevented him from making fully rational decisons....nonetheless he still created one of the most innovative games of a time.

Not a mental problem as such. He was a bit of a perfectionist, but many successful people in America are.
Of course, some of the most troubled people are perfectionists as well, so you may be on to something here.

 

[flashbacck]

Just as an FYI, saw this at slashdot:

...

Guess they can at least turn the mess into a movie....paging Uwe Boll!

I didn't think the article demonized Take-Two at all... If anything Boussard was portrayed as a poor project manager. I wouldn't be surprised if the article was missing facts. The author even states in the beginning he had a rough time getting anyone to talk. IMHO, Wired also has a tendency to sensationalize their stories.

 

[quikah]

The end made it almost sound like they could have finished DNF in another year if they would have made a deal with Take Two.

Also, kind of NSFW pic on the last page.

 

[sandorski]

DNF is gonna Rock!

 

[coloumb]

This is a lesson I learned a long time ago in the Navy. The lesson was reinforced frequently at my factory job and my depot job.


EDIT: DAMN!
I figured there was some crazy shit going on over there at 3D Realms. But that was insane. Its like they were trying to not get the game out.
Kinda sad.
If they had just released a halfway decent game in 2001, they would have had a buttload more money, could have hired a bunch more people, and been working on Duke Nukem 5 a long time ago.

Exactly. The few reports that were released over the years indicated they would mainly just goof off at the office. Why work when your previous product is bringing in the $$$? That's just plain lazy and stupid.

 

[n7]

Good read, even if it's not entirely accurate.

 

[lothar]

You'd be ill advised to take much of that article seriously. It's pretty biased and one-sided, like much of the news you see on CNN

***Official*** response from 3DRealms on this article.

...feel free to drive yourself crazy with speculation while wondering why we don't do things that seem very obvious to you, but that are very far from simple or obvious.

The best thing to do when there's little to no information is to speculate and make stuff up or make giant leaps of logic! Everyone knows that!

Carry on.

Other response relating to this article.

 

[shortylickens]

Well, the article wasnt speculation, it was the bare minimum of information the journalist could get from the handful of people who were willing to talk with him. And he said it wasnt the whole story and the details were not final. Sounds like Broussard was just coming up with the standard retort to a story he couldnt flat out deny.

Perfectionists also tend to be defensive.......

 

[mizzou]

unbelievable in my opinion. All that wait though, just 1 more release would be an immediate financial hit, even if it is a lame game.

We are all sort of awash in the quake and doom games, but we are still virgin eyed to duke nukem