Hail
to the king! Duke is back, although not in the way many of us
were anticipating. While Duke Nukem Forever takes it's sweet
time to complete it's development, Manhattan
Project went gold last month to kick ass and chew bubble
gum. For those of you who didn't have the pleasure of playing
a Duke Nukem game, Duke is a no-nonsense, alien ass-kicker.
He carries big guns, and spouts one liners with the best of
them. He's also very popular with the ladies. Manhattan Project
differs from the last Duke game, in that it's not a first person
shooter, but rather an console'ish side scroller. Actually,
this is how Duke Nukem started out, and the developers are bring
Duke back to his roots.
Developed
by Sunstorm Interactive, ARUSH
was kind enough to fire off a copy of Duke Nukem: Manhattan
Project. Although it's a side scroller, think Mario Bros., the
game engine is a 3D one. The plot? Well, it is a Duke Nukem
game, so you can be sure there are a lot of baddies to kill,
and babes to rescue. There are eight missions in the game, with
battles raging on the streets of New York, and in the subways.
Here's a snippet from their site...
"Duke
battles his way across towering skyscraper rooftops and through
gritty subway stations on the hunt for power-hungry villain,
Mech Morphix. Mutants of every kind are thrown at Duke as he
chases down Morphix through eight huge environments and avoids
the green slime called GLOPP that is causing all the chaos."
Installation
is straightforward, and right off the bat, you got your options
on how to setup the graphics. Let's see a console game do that.
There
are some additional settings you can configure, depending on
your hardware. I'd imagine the majority of you will have a computer
capable of playing the game at it's maximum settings.
Visuals
and Game Design
Using
the Prism3D engine, the game pulls off some impressive visuals.
Textures are nicely done, and character models are above average
for a platform shooter. It's not the same level as Jedi Knight
2, but there's a nice "cartooney" feeling to them.
The most impressive effects are the weapons though. There's
some cool dynamic lighting when you fire off the energy weapons.
On
our Athlon XP/GeForce 4 setup, the game ran as smooth as butter
with everything on. I tried it out on a Pentium III 733/TNT2,
and the game was playable with the maximum settings, but we
did encounter some stutter when enemies filled the screen. Playing
at 800x600 alieviated these issues.
Being
a console-type action game, there isn't anything particularly
complex about the level design. The level design varies. For
the most part, it's pretty obvious where to go, but there were
a few times where it felt like I was going in circles. The game
saves itself at certain points, but there's no other way of
saving the game as far as I can tell. That means if you busted
your ass to get to a certain point, and die, you'll have to
continue where the game last saved. Action moves left to right
(or vice-versa), and top to bottom. There is a zoom feature
available, and occasionally, the camera changes overhead, or
angled view, but your path is still linear.
Sound
was pretty good. The larger weapons have a nice "oomph"
to them, and the rock music totally suits the mood of the game.
Fans of the original Duke games will be pleased to know that
Jon St. John reprises the role of Duke's voice.
I
played the game with my keyboard, and it was a little strange.
You can program your keys accordingly, but if you have a gamepad,
you're better off using that. Some of the jumps are tricky to
do with the traditional WASD setup.
Gameplay
Simply
put, it's a blast. Being a Duke Nukem game, don't expect too
deep a story. The plot is to stop Morphix from controlling
New York City, and along the way, you blow up a bunch of mutants,
and save as many babes as you can. Despite the comical feel
to the graphics, make no mistake, this IS a Duke game. There's
plenty of gore, half naked chicks, and classical Duke humour.
You'll
start off with a gold plated Desert Eagle, but along the way,
you'll add plenty of artillery to Duke's weapon cache. My
favorite weapon is the anti-GLOPP gun, which as in previous
Duke games, it reverts the mutants back into their primitive
form.
There
are plenty of secret areas to uncover, and power-ups to gather.
Later on in the game, Duke will even pickup a jetpack, although
it lasts only a short while before dissapearing. There are
plenty of one-liners in the game, and some of them were hilarious.
Lest
we forget, the babes. Whenever Duke rescues a damsel in distress,
you're treated to a little dance. No doubt, this will set
the women's movement back about 30 years, but that's the way
it goes whenever a Duke game comes out.
There
are 8 levels in the game, all with various scripted events
and end bosses. The end bosses are quite challenging, but
battles tend to degrade into "blasting everything you
got into them". Every level has a number of scripted
sequences, such as cars and trains moving back and forth (which
you will have to dodge unless you want to end up in the windshield).
As with previous Duke Nukem games, there's plenty of secrets
to look for. Most of them require some kind of explosive to
reveal, and usually contain powerups, such as invincibility
and double damage.
A
couple of annoying parts of the game (and it's scattered throughout)
are the jumping puzzles, and the key finding. I found these
areas slowed down the frantic action a lot, but I suppose
without these puzzles, the casual gamer will likely finish
the game in a day. This brings us to another point, the game
is short. I consider myself an average gamer, but I was able
to finish the game in less than 6 hours. Granted, I didn't
look for every secret, nor did I try to kill every enemy,
but if you're the type who likes to wrap things up quickly,
this game won't take long to complete.
Final
Words
For
those of you anxiously awaiting Duke Nukem Forever, sorry,
this is not it. That shouldn't take away points from Manhattan
Project though. There isn't much depth, such as character
development, and complex subplots. It's a no-nonsense, 3D
action side-scroller, and it should provide plenty of fun
for a day or two. With no muliplayer capabilities, this game
won't take very long to complete for experienced gamers. There's
limited replay value, unless you want to go back to find every
little secret level in the game.
Manhattan
Project should be available everywhere by now, and should
fall into the budget category of 25$. Considering the quality
of some games that cost more, you can't really go wrong with
this one.
Pros:
Addictive, easy to pick up, explosions, guns and babes. Duke's
one-liners are worth the price of admission alone.
Cons:
Very short, some puzzle elements are uninteresting.
Bottom
Line: Console action fans should enjoy this game. PC gamers
(I'm one of them) might get frustrated with some of the "console"
features such as jumping puzzles, and limited saves. Outside
of that, I liked the game a lot, but it will be uninstalled
now that I finished it.
