[Lunick]

Posted by Green on the Duke4 Discord

Originally released for the Tapwave Zodiac and then was rereleased onto mobile phones with multiplayer, additional levels and 3D graphics, a port has been discovered for the Nintendo DS. It hasn't been dumped yet but the video shows 6 levels of the game, some history and a minor email exchange with Terry Nagy.

[UltravoxSapphire]

Well, at least it's not as bad as Critical Mass.

[necroslut]

While I'd be curious to see it dumped, it has me asking "why?". This game was OK I suppose for mobile phones, but for the DS it would have been an extremely sub-par experience, especially after Duke Nukem Advance on the previous gen.
Maybe it was done more as a proof-of-concept or demonstration or something, as they already had the code I guess it could have been quite easy to port.

[Tea Monster]

This is really lowest common denominator game making. A lot of HUD items are Duke3D sprites. Repetitive, cookie-cutter levels. What a crock! It would have taken a week or two by someone who cared what they were doing to make this 100 times better than it is.

[necroslut]

Tea Monster, on 04 May 2020 - 01:17 AM, said:

This is really lowest common denominator game making. A lot of HUD items are Duke3D sprites. Repetitive, cookie-cutter levels. What a crock! It would have taken a week or two by someone who cared what they were doing to make this 100 times better than it is.

Yeah, I've always wondered why they kept working with MachineWorks as they never seemed to make anything decent... It seems some fans would have done a much better job while still being cheap.

I noticed something though, that the 2D and 3D Duke Nukem Mobile games share most of the same general structure, same level locations (club Bel-Air, graveyard, mansion, zeppelin) same enemies and especially the three new boss monsters, so it's like it's own four-game sub-series.

[MusicallyInspired]

Someone did a port of Duke3D using EDuke32 as a base on the DS and it wasn't bad at all. There was just no music. I still have it works fine from what I remember. Great performance.

This is also relevant to my interests. Looking forward to a dump.

[Tea Monster]

I'm surprised nobody did anything like this in EDuke. Do some fake shading in Polymost, Get that early 2000 era feel down and make your own 'console-style game' but do it right.

[necroslut]

While I don't think this has been dumped yet, I noticed it seems to have the multiplayer content from the apparently lost "Duke Nukem Arena" version, so that's something.

[Smikes]

A few major updates on this:

1.) The owner has extracted the ROM file but has decided to postpone sharing it. The owner specifically cited concerns about the ROM file devaluing the cartridge. However, the owner isn't willing to sell either the cartridge or the ROM file at this time. Nevertheless, he says he still plans to share the ROM file eventually.

2.) Another leaked prototype was discovered one month before the Duke Nukem DS prototype. Crazy, I know! My source showed me footage from the game, and the title of the game appears nowhere on the Internet. Unfortunately, it only runs on BREW-based flip phones, and there are no BREW emulators to my knowledge. The game was discovered as part of a server cache with a ton of other mobile games, including a few other (non-Duke) games that look like they may be prototypes. The game includes a code signature ".sig" file issued by Verisign, so I think it's real, though I've emailed Verisign to ask them if there's any way to verify that it's genuine (still waiting to hear back). When opened as a TXT file, the ".sig" file contains the string "20071031" in a sea of non-alphanumeric noise, so I'm tentatively guessing it was created on October 31, 2007, which was four months after the release of Duke Nukem Arena. For some reason, my source still thinks it's from 2010. I shared the video footage with one of the developers listed in the credits, and he says he made some of the game's elements specifically for Duke Nukem Arena and that this game - if it's genuine - must have been compiled after he left the company. So all I know is that this game must have been created sometime after Duke Nukem Arena, since some of the game's elements didn't exist before then.

If anyone has any legal advice on what someone can or can't do with a canceled prototype, then please DM me with your email address.

[necroslut]

Smikes, on 14 June 2020 - 11:32 AM, said:

2.) Another leaked prototype was discovered one month before the Duke Nukem DS prototype. [,,,]

Interesting! So does is seem to be yet another update of Duke Mobile 3D, or something different?

[Smikes]

necroslut, on 14 June 2020 - 03:08 PM, said:

Interesting! So does is seem to be yet another update of Duke Mobile 3D, or something different?

My understanding is evolving pretty quickly. I managed to contact a second developer of the game, and he told me that he definitely remembers working on the game. So this is definitely real and not a hoax. However, it's not a prototype. He says it's a port of Duke Nukem Arena to an esoteric video game console that was never released in the US. As best I can tell, it's literally just Duke Nukem Arena but without the multiplayer. DM me with your email if you want to learn more

[KirbyGod]

Can anyone point me to place where I can play this game? It looks pretty good.