3D Realms' outspoken president trashes rumors that development of the long-delayed shooter will be accelerated to reap a $500,000 payment from Take-Two.
Late last week, Take-Two Interactive filed a 10-Q earnings statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Buried inside of it, the company noted that it had renegotiated its agreement with developer 3D Realms to publish the long-in-the-making shooter Duke Nukem Forever.
According to the 10-Q, the two parties agreed to new financial terms, which were listed in the 10-Q in thousands of dollars (figures have been updated to reflect real numbers): "In March 2005, the company [Take-Two] renegotiated a $6,000[,000] contingent obligation due upon delivery of the final PC version of Duke Nukem Forever through the payment of $4,250[,000] and issuance of a promissory note in the principal amount of $500[,000]. The payment of the promissory note is contingent upon the commercial release of such product prior to December 31, 2006."
With Take-Two holding out a $500,000 promissory note as a carrot to get Duke Nukem Forever, some PC gamers became hopeful that the project would be finished in time for the 2006 holiday season. Others worried that the storied title, which has been in development since 1997, would be rushed into production before it was truly ready.
Now, it seems the former group has had their hopes dashed--while the latter group has had its fears allayed. In a post on the 3D Realms forums started in part due to a GameSpot typographical error (which has since been corrected and apologized for), Broussard has dismissed the prospect that 3D Realms would be tempted by a half-million-dollar sum.
"As for the 500k completion bonus, I don't even know were that came from," said the outspoken executive. "I do know that we never cared or asked for it, and I think it was just tossed in as part of some other agreement. We're certainly not motivated by that amount of money, after all this time, and getting the game right is what matters. I would never ship a game early (even a couple of months), for 500k."
Broussard went on to outline the current status of Duke Nukem Forever. "Our deal is simple," he said. "We're making the game. It'll be done when it's done. We've funded 99.999% of the game (aside from a very, very small advance from GT Interactive, years ago, before Take 2 bought the game from them). It's our risk, our necks and our gamble. Under the deal we should be earning royalties from about unit 30,000 or so (that's a real small number)."
I might preorder this game, my great-grandchildren will surely love it.
Well this is welcome news. They were in such a big fucking rush to get it done, I was getting worried.
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Darth Wong wrote:I wonder if the people who thought up the name "Duke Nukem Forever" realized the irony of their use of the word "Forever" when they first coined it.
Or that the acronym means "did not finish" in sports.
"ok we'll make a generic duke nukem 3d sequel....OH SHIT UNREAL JUST CAME OUT....ok lets spend some time putting all thsi shit in.....OH SHIT THERES HALF LIFE..... ok now this....FUCK ME THERES DOOM 3....ok add all this....GOD DAMMIT VALVE WHYD YOU MAKE HALF LIFE 2...."
In the time that Duke Nukem Forever has been in development, we have planned, designed, built, and crashed an object on Mars... twice.
Mayabird is my girlfriend
Justice League:BotM:MM:SDnet City Watch:Cybertron's Finest "Well then, science is bullshit. "
-revprez, with yet another brilliant rebuttal.
Hmm. I think there's only one real explanation for this- The DNF department consists of six malnourished monkeys, a Windows 3x machine without a keyboard, and a blind man with no feet. Although, even then you'd think the game would be done within a decade.
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Battlehymn Republic wrote:What is everybody expecting that it'll be like, anyways? It's not going to be fucking Half-Life 2.
Over a decade in the making, 3D Relms better make it Half Life 3 and 4, and they know this. Unless it completely bombs, I'm definetely going to get it, and judge for myself.
Brains! "I would ask if the irony of starting a war to spread democracy while ignoring public opinion polls at home would occur to George W. Bush, but then I check myself and realize that
I'm talking about a trained monkey."-Darth Wong "All I ever got was "evil liberal commie-nazi". Yes, he called me a communist nazi."-DPDarkPrimus
Wicked Pilot wrote:I'm quite sure I remember reading about DN:F in PCGamer back in high school. I guess I just assumed in came out years ago and I just missed it.
It's been "in deveopment" since 1997. The project was restarted a few times, usually when the engine they licensed became obsolete.
Wicked Pilot wrote:I'm quite sure I remember reading about DN:F in PCGamer back in high school. I guess I just assumed in came out years ago and I just missed it.
It's been "in deveopment" since 1997. The project was restarted a few times, usually when the engine they licensed became obsolete.
They specifically stated that had alot of false starts, and they wiped the slate clean in 2002. Now, they are using the Unreal Warfare engine, and, according to PCG, it looks damn good.
Brains! "I would ask if the irony of starting a war to spread democracy while ignoring public opinion polls at home would occur to George W. Bush, but then I check myself and realize that
I'm talking about a trained monkey."-Darth Wong "All I ever got was "evil liberal commie-nazi". Yes, he called me a communist nazi."-DPDarkPrimus
Wicked Pilot wrote:I'm quite sure I remember reading about DN:F in PCGamer back in high school. I guess I just assumed in came out years ago and I just missed it.
It's been "in deveopment" since 1997. The project was restarted a few times, usually when the engine they licensed became obsolete.
They specifically stated that had alot of false starts, and they wiped the slate clean in 2002. Now, they are using the Unreal Warfare engine, and, according to PCG, it looks damn good.
Doom 3 engine rather. Which they also use on Prey.
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Bounty wrote:
It's been "in deveopment" since 1997. The project was restarted a few times, usually when the engine they licensed became obsolete.
They specifically stated that had alot of false starts, and they wiped the slate clean in 2002. Now, they are using the Unreal Warfare engine, and, according to PCG, it looks damn good.
Doom 3 engine rather. Which they also use on Prey.
Huh. I could have sworn that they were sticking with the Unreal Warfare engine with DNF. They even said that specifically, IIRC.
EDIT!!!!!!
Here's what wikipedia had to say:
On September 9, 2004, GameSpot published a conversation between Take Two CEO Rich Roedel and UBS analyst Mike Wallace which alleged that Duke Nukem Forever had switched to the Doom 3 engine. Many gaming news sites mailed George Broussard to have him confirm or deny the rumor, but after receiving no answer from him, they published the rumor as fact, ending the article with "Attempts to contact 3D Realms for comment were unsuccessful as of press time." Later that day, George Broussard explicitly denied the rumor and explained that he was not able to answer the emails only because he was working elsewhere in the building. As of May 2005, it is believed that Rich Roedel had mistaken DNF for Prey, which Human Head (supervised by 3D Realms) is developing with the Doom 3 engine.
Brains! "I would ask if the irony of starting a war to spread democracy while ignoring public opinion polls at home would occur to George W. Bush, but then I check myself and realize that
I'm talking about a trained monkey."-Darth Wong "All I ever got was "evil liberal commie-nazi". Yes, he called me a communist nazi."-DPDarkPrimus
