About eternity projects

(Yes, Im still yet to finish my last post, to which I promised sequel, this isint it, though)

Around this time each year, I have a tradition.

Checking out Duke Nukem Forever webpage. And each year I have great laughs on that subject. I remember Daikatana, and laugh heartily again .

Dosen't say anything to you, does this? Yes, Im fastily becoming an old fart, and I know it well. So, I thought I would tell you the story of these two games, as they are very funny indeed.

John Romero was a superstar in videogames (does anyone know why the are called thus? Videogames?). One of the founders of id Software, he was a leading force behind Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, and Quake. Each of these games was groundbreaking, and more importantly, financially very, VERY succesful. They developed the First Person Shooter, and to this day, new Doom and Quake can be assured to revolutionarize -or at least, bring something new - to the genre, to what is possible to do with the graphics.

John Romero thought to strike it on his own. He created a new company, named Ion Storm, got Eidos (the company behind Tomb Raider) finanzing it, and announced he would do a game named Daikatana. Now, this would be HUGE. Im quoting wikipedia;
Romero's initial game design, completed in March 1997, called for a huge amount of content -- 24 levels split into 4 distinct time periods, 25 weapons, and 64 monsters. Despite this, Romero believed the game could be completed in seven months, just in time for Christmas 1997. Expect he couldnt. The date got slipping farther and farther into future. And while the game was in develoment Romero lived like a rockstar. He got office for the company in the toppermost floor in a skyscraper (I heard somewhere that the doorknobs there would have been gold), raced heavily modded Ferraris, got interviewed by several periodicals; Time wrote that "Everything that game designer John Romero touches turns to gore and gold." Underlined by the fact that they had things like (again, from wiki;) an infamous [...] advertisement for Daikatana [...] with large black lettering proclaiming "John Romero's about to make you his bitch" [...]nothing else [...] but a small tag-line reading "Suck It Down" and an Ion Storm logo.

In the end the game came out in 2000. The AI of the game sucked, the graphics looked three years old (even six months was "old", thats how fast the industry developed), and many of the salepoints of the game were, infact, its weak points. Did I mention it didnt sell that well?
John Romero was one of the jokes of gaming community back on its day, for examble in Megatokyo, back when it was still good.

Now, to Duke Nukem Forever. There are two Duke Nukem-games in the early 90s, they were pretty run-out-of-the-mill games, where character jumped up and down like Mario and shot aliens (not like in Mario). Then, in '96 Duke Nukem 3D came out.
It was cool. There was multiplayer, you got to shoot aliens (and other players), there were dirty phrases and you could go to toilet to piss or pay strippers so they showed you their tits (thanks to the graphics of that time, it wasnt that special, though). Playing DM3D multiplayer is one of my best memories, back when I was 13. We played it at school on multiplayer (I sucked, I had no idea how to do evasive action and always got shot. I was much better in Quake). Now, DM3D sold really well, really well indeed. And so sequel was announced, in early '97. It would be published by Christmas '98, and it would be huge. It would be better looking, cooler, gutsier &c than any other game in the market.
There was Hype, oh, how there was hype. Back then there was PC Gamer being published in Finland, too. It was rather expensive magazine, as it came with two demo-CD's (back when the topspeed in net was 36k (that is, 3,6 kilobytes per second).. our computer had 28k modem). Me and bros, we gave the magazine as Christmas and birthday-presents to each others, as it was the only way we could justify to each other the price. But thats off the topic. Anyway, it had big hypes on the game, and we bought it all. Even thought it was wrapped in stupid story about the reporter crawling into high-security building stealing peaks on the plans (as opposed to taking part in tour and copypasting from mediafile). And we waited for the game. And waited.
The game was developed by 3D Games and thanks to money from Max Payne (another eternity project) and its sequel, the company floats very well still. Infact, it floats so well that the game is still in develoment. Nine years after they started programming, eight years after it was supposed to be finished. And after nine years, the game still dosent have any screenshots to be shown. Imagine that.
Oh, and in case you are not familiar on the subject, today, game is made in one to three years, depending on the subject. Nine, however, must be the record. The game is still in production, there are people who are still paid to write the code. Would think that employers would notice they dont get anything done.

That is my dream job. To get paid continually for nine years, for the job of one or two, and employer still keeping faith in me that I shall finish it.. one day. And not fairing me.