ShackNews are reporting that the Xbox Live Arcade version of the Shareware classic, Duke Nukem 3D, is finished and now "in the hands of Microsoft" as far as getting it out to the very suspecting gaming public.

According to the report, the final version of the game made it through the XBLA testing hoops on its first round, and all 12 Achievements have been approved and include milestones such as tipping strippers, stepping in doodoo and stomping on specific numbers of enemies (all 12 can be seen with the above link).

There's no solid release date yet, but could this be viewed as something of a small rock rolling
down a larger hill in the marketing and campaign avalanche that will eventually be Duke Nukem
Forever? You be the judge.

A little old, but still makes me laugh: http://duke.a-13.net/

Shake em baby

3D games of that era dont age well graphically

Duke Nukem 3D was one of the last major game titles released built on the DOS platform wasn't it?

it still has its charms

I don't think the game engine in Duke 3D makes it dated, because I'm seeing a few games on the Wii and such that rely on combining 2D sprites with 3D calculations. I would consider it more stylistic, though in reality they would have gone with a newer engine given the chance.

This is interesting:

Since Doom was not a fully 3D engine, it was considered to be a 2.5D game. This 2.5D engine design limited Doom to relatively simple non-overlapping map designs since it is not possible for there to be an exposed bridge or balcony that the player can both see over and walk under. In Doom, only a simple moving platform rising up in front of the player could allow the player to cross over a path they previous walked along below.

The Build engine solves this problem by allowing multiple overlapping 2D paths to cross through the same 2D location. The key is that while inside one of these spaces, it is not possible to see into the other space, and so the 2.5D engine has no problem rendering one space or the other even though the map data literally shows the two areas to be occupying the same place. Several Duke Nukem 3D maps exploit this engine feature to create bizarre mind-bending maps where multiple large rooms all seem to be occupying one 3D space. One secret level in particular ("Lunatic Fringe" from episode 2, Lunar Apocalypse) has a map where the player can travel 720 degrees around a circle and not cross their path. This would be much more difficult to duplicate with modern true-3D map editors and engines.

I'd like to see less game engines strive to represent the physical universe accurately, and intentionally do more strange stuff like that. I realise in this case it was a result of limitations, not a design choice.

Yeah duke3d wasn't a true 3d engine but was the closest thing to it at the time, it was quite clever in the way it was made to seem 3d. In a single room, the only way to create a object that gave a 3d effect like a bridge that you could walk underneath was done using a 2d sprite. But the real trick was having a room appear to be on top of another room. The editor didn't allow you to do this, the way around it was to put in an invisible teleport that would make it seem as if you moving to a higher/lower floor, the same technique was used moving from above water to underwater. If done properly, it was pretty seemless.

I spent many many hours building levels with the duke editor back in the day :)

The gameplay looks amazing

duke nukem the movie would be the ultimate. ♠

edit: why is there a spade on the end of my post?

♠

maybe you meant to say 'duke nukem the movie would be the ultimate spade'

dukes awesome no matter how long it takes to not come out

"MUUUM, Duke won't come out of the closet!"

Lol in the duke movie.. checkout the duke ventrilo harassment..

"gtfo my vent server" hannd thats why u pword ya vent.. and have a public vent.