Fifteen years is an awfully long time. Even in gaming terms, entire series' have been created and sold millions within this timeframe - every major gaming console's lifespan has happened within a shorter period of time too. Yet fifteen years is how long the development of one of gaming's most infamous sequels took - Duke Nukem Forever. The title was originally announced by 3D Realms way back in 1997 and after several release dates came and went with no game, 3D Realms stated that the game would be released when it was done. The next time the public got their eyes on The Duke it was a teaser trailer released in 2007, ten whole years after that initial announcement; which is an astonishingly long period of time. It got worse though. 3D Realms was downsized to cut costs and the game's development team left the studio, even after it was apparently ready to go Gold (indicating it was pretty much complete), making the entire project vanish into thin air. Finally in 2010, 2K Games officially announced that Gearbox had taken over development of the game and after 15 laborious years of development, Forever hit shelves on June 2nd 2011. Even then, people presumed the whole thing was a hoax - that's just how long and insane this entire process was. So was it worth the wait? Of course not. With horrible controls, awful loading times and an offensive sense of humour which showed just how dated the game was, Duke Nukem Forever was officially a flop. Noticeably, the game served as a callback to FPS titles of old but it lacked their speed and excitement; instead the whole thing crawled along at a snail's pace. Above all else, critics stated simply that Duke Nukem simply wasn't a modern day hero; the gaming world had moved on from the likes of him. It's really quite amazing that 2K and Gearbox decided to pick up and finish the project to be honest, being that it was clearly destined to fail. Will Duke Nukem Forever's impressive development time ever be topped? Valve seem to be making a good attempt at it with Half-Life 3 (or Episode Three or whatever they're conjuring up) but Duke Nukem Forever will more than likely hold the crown for Biggest Waste Of Fifteen Years for some time to come. Hail to the King of development time, baby.
I have an addiction to achievements, a craving for new bands and a dream to become Captain America. I once finished second in a Mario Kart 7 tournament so I'm kind of a big deal.
