Tits, Tuts And The Last Action Hero: Pitchford Defends Duke Nukem Forever

[Gamasutra's Simon Parkin spends an evening with Randy Pitchford, midwife to Duke Nukem Forever, gaming's most-delayed project, to hear about why the character is as relevant today as he was in 1991.] "Of all the things I planned to talk about tonight, the gay robot sidekick was not among them." Randy Pitchford, current and final steward of Duke Nukem Forever, the video game that has been in development for longer than any other, shoots the front three rows of assembled journalists a glare. "But I am at a BAFTA event after all. You have to take a gamble with these things. Don't screw me on this please." Gambling on things is something Pitchford became well acquainted with in 2009 when his studio, Gearbox Software acquired the rights to the beleaguered franchise. Part of that package was the code to Duke Nukem Forever, the game that 3D Realms had been toiling away at since 1997 before having to sell Duke away due to lack of funding. By that point the game had become an industry laughing stock, its shared acronym with the term 'Did Not Finish' a punch-line to a joke that, for staff at 3D Realms, at least, was more tragedy than comedy. Pitchford describes looking over the scraps of the completed game that came to him in the deal as "feeling a bit like Indiana Jones, finding jewels of great worth that simply had to be shown to the wider world." And so, for the next 24 months, Pitchford and his team have been working to tie up 3D Realms' vision for the game, tailoring it for multiplatform release, and creating a slew of multiplayer modes to sit alongside the near-complete single-player campaign that they were given in the acquisition. So why the gamble? Because Duke Nukem is a gung-ho, misogynist knucklehead; a Schwarzenegger parody whose quips have none of the wit of a Nathan Drake and whose character is as fleeting as the cigar smoke that leaks incessantly from his mouth. He is an anachronism born of gaming's juvenile years when the hobby was a grubby niche and its primary audience horny teenage boys for whom a pixelated cleavage represented the dizzying height of puberty-era titillation. Today, every computer is "a window to infinite pornography," as Pitchford puts it with wry eloquence. What interest would a teenage boy have in a waxy-textured stripper? And what interest would a 30-something man have in a one-dimensional sexist monster? What hope has that of selling? "Before we jumped in with the acquisition we all studied what the character and gameplay meant in today's world. We reflected on this a lot, looked at the internet and studied trends trying to work out if Duke has a place in the contemporary landscape of games. In that process it became clear that Duke Nukem had become a meme. I don't know why that happened. It has nothing to do with truly great Duke Nukem games because, honestly, there haven't been any. It's something to do with him: the character." Pitchford has no doubts that Nukem is relevant today, likening the character to Tony Stark in the recent Iron Man films. "When we think about Duke: he is such an interesting guy," he enthuses. "He is nothing like me at all. He has the biggest ego in the world. In his universe everyone loves him. He is super rich and crazy. I think that is one of the reasons that Duke is so sticky at the moment. Most of our heroes in contemporary media have become emo. Even I am guilty of it. With Brothers In Arms [Gearbox's somewhat worthy-minded World War II-themed first person shooter series] we took a tone that was all about sacrifice and loss. Duke, by contrast, doesn't have any freaking problems. He just kicks ass. It's surprisingly fresh to have a guy turn up like that who doesn't give a crap." Pitchford's fondness for the character may have something to do with the length of time the pair has been acquainted. The designer's first job in the industry was working at 3D Realms on Duke Nukem 3D. "I was studying law at UCLA paying my way through college as a professional magician. My girlfriend at the time [who later became his wife] pointed out that I was spending all my free time playing and making video games. So I decided to stop law and see what was out there in the industry. Very soon I had two offers on the table: one from LucasArts and the other was from 3D Realms who were working on Duke Nukem 3D." In 1997 Pitchford left 3D Realms to found Gearbox Software and it was his involvement in the series that made him such a suitable buyer for the IP. "Duke Nukem was one of the formative titles in the first-person shooter genre," he explains. "The game brought to the table alternate ways to engage in combat: trip wires and pipe bombs. Pacing between action and puzzle solving. These things become the rulebook that we have all been evolving and iterating over the years." "But recently I feel like the shooter genre has become so narrow in its form of expression. If you boil down Call of Duty et al, there's nothing more than a string of reaction tests going on there. Every test is a complication on that simple mechanic. But Duke Nukem always had more than that. There's the chance to outsmart your opponents, for sure. But more than that, I love the non-sequitirs in the series. Just silly set pieces that are kind of throwaway. Half-Life 2 had that kind of thing. But it's faded from the medium more recently. I think Duke Nukem Forever has many little things like this to remind us how great that kind of experience is. " Of course, it's not easy to forget that many of these set-piece interactions are of the scatological or sexual variety. The opening scene of the game sees Nukem sitting down to play the video game of his exploits (which, after 12 years, has eventually been released) while receiving oral sex from a pair of twins. Pitchford sees this kind of interaction as somewhat shocking, but well within the realm of what is acceptable in a video game. "We know as gamers that this medium is important," he says. "I know from my own experience that the critical thinking that I have developed is a consequence of using video games as a pastime. They've forced me to be creative. This equips us for many things in life. Before games existed we played cops and robbers and would be horribly creative. All of us had this experience: that is fantasy. Runs the full spectrum from unicorns to the most extreme situations. That is where heroes are born. I think it's okay to make games anywhere along that spectrum." And as for the gay robot sidekick? Unexpectedly, it's a character that the Duke Nukem Forever team contemplated while at 3D Realms when exploring a possible origin story for the character. "We thought it might be interesting to see how Duke might relate to a partner that had a different sexual orientation. Ultimately we thought there's an endpoint, where he's a one-man show. I don't want to spoil it too much, as we may go there. But Duke and the robot developed a great bond. We'll see if he makes a return." Whatever you think of the series, its boisterous humor, juvenile titillation and contemptible attitudes, it's hard to not be a little caught up in Pitchford's unrelenting excitement for the project. There's a lack of pretense here that is, somehow, appealing. And as the designer is quick to point out, no project can be in development for such a long time, unless there are people working on it that have passion and belief in what they are creating. "That's the spark that brought me into the project," he says. "People gave up significant portions of their lives for this project. The end credits list is extensive and includes names that have gone on to work at Valve, or create the Uncharted games. Duke Nukem Forever is a part of our industry's history. It's going to be an amazing feeling to see this game ship."