Duke Nukem Forever -- Gone at last

[Philondra]

Most of you have probably heard this by now, but it bears repeating: the most prolific piece of vaporware in the history of video games has been .... vaporized.

Duke Nukem forever has been officially plugged due to the shutting down of 3D Realms, the company developing it.
Duke Nukem forever was announced more than 12 years ago - April 28, 1997.

Here's an interesting website with a post-mortem on Duke Nukem forever, including a list of things that have happened in the world since Duke Nukem forever was announced. It's a really great read:

http://duke.a-13.net/

Here are some of my favorites:

* While DNF has been in production, Blizzard Entertainment, another studio famous for delays, has released four full games(Starcraft, Diablo 2, Warcraft 3, and World of Warcraft), with expansions for all of them.
* In April of 1997, Google, eBay, and the term "weblog" didn't exist.
* Britney Spears' entire musical career as a pop star has taken place during Duke Nukem Forever's development.
* The entire line of Grand Theft Auto games was released.
* If someone bought one of every single Magic: The Gathering card printed since DNF was announced, they would have a collection of approximately 101,742 cards.

Here's somethings personal yet striking: In the entire time that Duke Nukem Forever was in development, I began studying Japanese, got my drivers' license, started my first summer employment, entered university, studied abroad in Japan, met my fiancee, came back from Japan, graduated from university, got my first real job, moved to Japan, became a translator, and made lots of money.

* I had not yet started studying Japanese. I now make lots of money as a J-->E Translator.

[Dropdeadqt]

I can't say I have followed this travesty of software development, but I am now very curious...

How much did this colossal piece of vaporware end up costing...?

[Cartollomew]

I don't think anyone can know for sure.

A lot depends on how much actual development time went into it, and how much was just marketing fluff.

Also (to state the obvious), while Blizzard are "famous for delays", they either release the software or can it. The closest they've ever gotten to vaporware is Starcraft:Ghost, but they dropped that as soon as someone decided it wouldn't work out, which was relatively soon into development and promotion.

Blizzard are known for delays due to polishing - DNF didn't end up with anything to polish.

[Mews]

I'll give you something to polish.

It's pretty epic the time span though, 12 years. That's literally more than half my life.

[Karjalan]

Duke Nukem 3d was so epic though

SIGH WTB someone picking up.

Actually how the fuck is it even possible to last 12 years?

[Mitra]

[quote]- The two Mars rovers, Spirit and Opportunity were proposed, authorized, announced, designed, launched and successfully landed upon Mars where they have been exploring the surface for over 2.5 years.
-The Airbus A380 "Super Jumbo" plane was designed, built, tested, and delivered to airlines
- Bill Clinton finished his presidential term, George W. Bush was elected and re-elected. (Barack Obama was elected)