Why waste time pontificating when we could just deliver you the goods? Duke Nukem certainly wouldn’t. If you want to hear some thoughts on the long-awaited sequel, see our editorial below. For the trailer itself, just click on through!

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One-minute-eleven mostly of Duke pumping iron is a bit disappointing, but the fact that it looks real-time at least shows that the 3D Realms staff isn’t sitting around gazing at their navels all day. It’s nice to see the aliens and pigcops, too (even if only for a split second), but we just thought they’d have even more to show us after all these years. Of course, they could just be saving all the gameplay details for the PC Gamer cover issue, so it looks like we’ll have to wait until that hits shelves to get anything significant out of this.

Over ten years in the making, Duke Nukem Forever has the potential to be a bloated, confusing mess of worn-out ideas and half-hearted attempts. Overambition is the enemy of any game designer (just ask Peter Molyneux or Yasumi Matsuno). Yet, even when the main goal at this point is to just hurry up and get the product out the door, there are still a few ways that the game could capture our hearts and minds all over again.

The first thing they need to do is give us the most interactive environments this side of a Kojima game. Remember how we obsessed over the way ice cubes melted when the first hands-on previews of Metal Gear Solid 2 hit the web? With this much development time under their belts, Broussard and company better have a crazy amount of detail in their game.

It was always a hallmark of the series in the first place. Being able to go into a bathroom and flush the toilet (plus getting a health boost for it) was pretty crazy stuff back in the time of Duke Nukem 3D. Shadow Warrior continued the tradition.

What’s changed since then? Not as much as you’d think, to be honest. Many of the most high-profile first-person-shooters out there still feature remarkably static environments, save the odd exploding barrel or flipped vehicle. The rare exception would be, of course, Half-Life 2 and its unforgettable Gravity Gun, which allows you to pick up or manipulate almost any object in the world.

The reluctance to make more interactive environments might come from a fear of letting the player control too much of the experience, resulting in unforeseen glitches or ways to ruin the way the game is played . Even HL2 must occasionally fall into the trap of creating tight, scripted sequences intended to keep the player on track.

DNF will hopefully break this mold, but even if it doesn’t, we’d probably just settle for some tactile wackiness. Let us grab breasts, let us go gambling in the casino, let us tear down a building with our bare hands. That’s all we ask!

Broussard’s claimed before that Forever would be one of the best action games ever, and the only way to accomplish that is to either provide the player with the freedom to shape their environment or give them the most memorable set pieces they’ve ever experienced. Both would be nice, of course, but one could imagine the nightmare that would cause for play-balancing. Maybe that is what they’ve been doing all of these years…

Regardless, I hope 3D Realms lays it on thick. Just make the whole scenario as nutty as humanly possible. Duke Nukem doesn’t need a good story, but he needs a crazy one that’s going to allow for all sorts of over-the-top sequences nobody’s seen before. How about riding an atomic bomb Major Kong-style as it rockets towards the ground, all the while dual-wielding rocket launchers and blasting pigcops out of the sky as they attempt to thwart your effort to blow up a major alien stronghold.

There’s no need for rules or regulations to apply in Duke’s world, because he can do whatever the hell he wants.

Which is another thing I want from Duke Nukem Forever, just let Duke Nukem be as “Duke Nukem” as he wants to be. The more I look back at what I’ve written so far, the more I realize that what I’m asking for is a Duke Nukem game — everything that made the original game so much fun amped up to 11. Keep Duke’s ass-kicking, lack-of-bubble-gumming, wise-cracking attitude and all that it entails.

My concern is more about whether we’re going to be getting Duke Nukem Forever 2008, or if we’re merely getting Duke Nukem Forever ‘97 in the year 2008. As great as the old tropes were, we don’t need similarly old concepts that ignore all of the advances and changes made to the genre (and, really, games in general) since the late nineties.

There have been impostors over the years (Serious Sam), but it’s time for the king to reclaim his throne. Duke Nukem Forever may end up being a pile of ass, but we should be willing to give it the benefit of the doubt. No amount of awesome graphics or multiplayer features are going to make DNF a great game. No, they’d merely make it a good one. What’ll make it great is the Duke’s style, and more than anything, that’s what needs to stay the same.