Incline Ion Fury (formerly Ion Maiden) - Build Engine powered FPS by Duke Nukem 3D mappers - now with Aftershock DLC

[Astral Rag]

Also from 1995 and not really a FPS in my book. Decent game(s) though.

 

[Lyric Suite]

Ideally of course making a game more difficult should involve better, smarter AI. Bullet sponges and hit point bloat are a big no no for me. Which path does Ion Maiden take in its new difficulty settings? All natural or huge pendulous tits of silicon?

These kinds of shooters were never about enemy AI.

Yeah, enemy placement is where it's at.

 

[Darth Slaughter]

Very good video except for the fact that the devs call Quake the first True 3D FPS™

Why does everyone always seem to forget Future Shock.

He wants a word with you.

I almost replied to Astral Rag's his thread mentioning descent but I read his statement again and its "true 3D FPS". Although descent was released in the same month (december 1994) as herectic and sold as a similar game, back in those days they were also sold as "Action" games. The term FPS came later and descent wouldn't qualify. The thing is that at that time, descent was meant to appeal to doom players.

Also from 1995 and not really a FPS in my book. Decent game(s) though.

It was from 1994, the shareware version.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Wait... the reason you two are dismissing Descent from this is because you don't consider it a FPS?

Even though it does the exact same things as any other FPS game released both before and after it, in a true 3D environment that employs all six axis equally?

Are you really going to tell me that the ability to jump around (instead of flying around) matters that much?

Or is this about what game was the first to coin the term "FPS"? Well, regardless of what game was the first to use the term, it also applies to Descent, like it or not. If it looks like a duck, moves like a duck, quacks like a duck and shoots like an armed duck... guess what?

 

[Darth Slaughter]

Wait... the reason you two are dismissing Descent from this is because you don't consider it a FPS?

Even though it does the exact same things as any other FPS game released both before and after it, in a true 3D environment that employs all six axis equally?

Are you really going to tell me that the ability to jump around (instead of flying around) matters that much?

Or is this about what game was the first to coin the term "FPS"? Well, regardless of what game was the first to use the term, it also applies to Descent,

No, I dismissed it to avoid this kind of conversation!

And I had the impression Astral Rag would dismiss because he was refering to typical FPS that has similar gameplay. FPS in the strict sense, as the term that fully defines the game. Because if you wide the space for descent to fit, you have to wide it for many other games.

For modern genre designations, descent is a 6DoF. I don't think descent fits the FPS denomination just like a game like thief (had to mention it) doesn't fit.

Anyway, The term FPS stuck long after quake, and mostly to define games where you control a soldier/man that uses legs as a mean of transportation and is an action game rather than an RPG or simulation. And to stop calling them doom type or doom clone. Even thief would qualify as an FPS back then but it didn't feel right, and they even tried to coin a specific FPS word for it - with an that "S" stands for Sneaker.

Descent also was about you piloting a starship, so if you put descent in the FPS category, so Quarantine does qualify too. And quarantine you were piloting a Cab. What makes them different than, say, the great number of fully 3d flight and car simulators that came even before doom and had first person perspective? Other games that can be worth mentioned is Terminal Velocity and Fury3 that were kind of spawned as descent clones, what do they have to do with doom, quake? Then, Mechwarrior 2 and X-wing (1993) would fit too. And what about Magic Carpet. It has 2d sprites but was it an FPS also?

The point is: descent was compared to doom back then because it was released in a time doom like games were becoming a trend and everyone wanted to capitalize on it. And they were all "action" games. Also, some descent gameplay elements were very similar: closed levels, fixed weapons progression, finding keys, getting shield and health. But so does thief. But when the FPS word became to specific, it would actually dismiss games like thief, descent, even RPGs with first person perspectives, like deus ex and VTM:B. They had a lot of other more important gameplay elements that labeling them FPS is too limiting.

like it or not. If it looks like a duck, moves like a duck, quacks like a duck and shoots like an armed duck... guess what?

It's a Swan? maybe a chicken? well, you couldn't fly in doom, maybe doom is an ostrich.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

No, I dismissed it to avoid this kind of conversation!

Too bad, you're having it! :D

FPS in the strict sense, as the term that fully defines the game. Because if you wide the space for descent to fit, you have to wide it for many other games.

We have to acknowledge the problem that not a single term for a gaming genre is set in stone. Not a single one. It's not just a problem of "What is an RPG?", but also "What is an Adventure Game?" or "What is a Puzzle Game?", and so on. Oh sure, we can get pretty close by adding a few basic definitions, but there will always be disagreement on what should be in and what should not, and that's why you're reading this.

To me FPS is "first-person shooter", a sub-genre of gaming where the game is trying to show the gameworld through the eyes of the player, with a primary focus on shooting bad guys, and with little or no secondary focus. Move around, get guns, kill monsters, clear level, fight the occasional boss, repeat, all in real-time. Generally speaking they're arcade-ish in gameplay, simple and to the point. (There's tons more things I could say to define it further, but you get the idea.) Wolfenstein 3D fits this, Doom fits this, Quake fits this, the Build games fit this... so why don't Descent, Thief, Quarantine, Mechwarrior, Magic Carpet or X-Wing?

Let's look at non-contenders you brought up. For starters, Thief's focus is not on getting guns, killing monsters or fighting the occasional boss. Even moving around is done differently, as the emphasis is not on speed, but on stealth. Garrett is also a non-combatant, and has trouble even fighting spiders! X-Wing is clearly a flight simulator and not a FPS, the focus is first on piloting the craft and keeping it in one piece. That means diverting powers to various systems and having to obey physics while moving. The game doesn't even require you to shoot bad guys all the time. Mechwarrior also is not a FPS for the same reason, the primary focus is on piloting the mech, shooting bad guys comes second (or even third).

Magic Carpet is an interesting example, but not an FPS. It's a strategy game where you build and maintain a castle, while trying to destroy the enemy's castle. The fact that it's shown in a first-person perspective is pretty cool, but doesn't change the basic facts. I haven't played Quarantine since it was originally released, but what I remember it's a very arcade-ish game, while yet trying to be a little deeper than the norm. There were missions, for example, but they usually involved either taking a passenger from Point A to Point B or shooting something to bits. Quarantine to me is clearly an FPS, but one that's trying to grow beyond what makes for a generic FPS. (Hexen also tried the same, yet no one seems to challenge its claim of being an FPS, even though you can fly around!)

Which leaves us with Descent. The only real difference between all those 'classic' FPS examples mentioned earlier and this game, is that you're flying a small spacecraft instead of running around on two legs. And yet, Descent is a very arcade-like game. You don't have to micromanage the ship like in X-Wing, or worry about weapon systems like in Mechwarrior. The emphasis is on shooting things and how to shoot them. That makes all three Descent games into FPS games for me, and also Terminaly Velocity/Fury3, very arcade-like games with an emphasis on flying instead of bipedal movement.

What it ultimately comes down to, is that we disagree on where the boundaries for "FPS" games lie. You say I draw it too far, I say you don't draw it far enough. But because no GamerGod has dispatched his version of Moses to come down and bless us with the Sacred Definitions of Game Genres, we're stuck with arguments like this 'till the cows come home.

 

[Darth Slaughter]

No, I dismissed it to avoid this kind of conversation!

Too bad, you're having it! :D

Yes, but today I was in the mood.

FPS in the strict sense, as the term that fully defines the game. Because if you wide the space for descent to fit, you have to wide it for many other games.

We have to acknowledge the problem that not a single term for a gaming genre is set in stone. Not a single one. It's not just a problem of "What is an RPG?", but also "What is an Adventure Game?" or "What is a Puzzle Game?", and so on. Oh sure, we can get pretty close by adding a few basic definitions, but there will always be disagreement on what should be in and what should not, and that's why you're reading this.

To me FPS is "first-person shooter", a sub-genre of gaming where the game is trying to show the gameworld through the eyes of the player, with a primary focus on shooting bad guys, and with little or no secondary focus. Move around, get guns, kill monsters, clear level, fight the occasional boss, repeat, all in real-time. Generally speaking they're arcade-ish in gameplay, simple and to the point. (There's tons more things I could say to define it further, but you get the idea.) Wolfenstein 3D fits this, Doom fits this, Quake fits this, the Build games fit this... so why don't Descent, Thief, Quarantine, Mechwarrior, Magic Carpet or X-Wing?

Let's look at non-contenders you brought up. For starters, Thief's focus is not on getting guns, killing monsters or fighting the occasional boss. Even moving around is done differently, as the emphasis is not on speed, but on stealth. Garrett is also a non-combatant, and has trouble even fighting spiders! X-Wing is clearly a flight simulator and not a FPS, the focus is first on piloting the craft and keeping it in one piece. That means diverting powers to various systems and having to obey physics while moving. The game doesn't even require you to shoot bad guys all the time. Mechwarrior also is not a FPS for the same reason, the primary focus is on piloting the mech, shooting bad guys comes second (or even third).

Magic Carpet is an interesting example, but not an FPS. It's a strategy game where you build and maintain a castle, while trying to destroy the enemy's castle. The fact that it's shown in a first-person perspective is pretty cool, but doesn't change the basic facts. I haven't played Quarantine since it was originally released, but what I remember it's a very arcade-ish game, while yet trying to be a little deeper than the norm. There were missions, for example, but they usually involved either taking a passenger from Point A to Point B or shooting something to bits. Quarantine to me is clearly an FPS, but one that's trying to grow beyond what makes for a generic FPS. (Hexen also tried the same, yet no one seems to challenge its claim of being an FPS, even though you can fly around!)

Which leaves us with Descent. The only real difference between all those 'classic' FPS examples mentioned earlier and this game, is that you're flying a small spacecraft instead of running around on two legs. And yet, Descent is a very arcade-like game. You don't have to micromanage the ship like in X-Wing, or worry about weapon systems like in Mechwarrior. The emphasis is on shooting things and how to shoot them. That makes all three Descent games into FPS games for me, and also Terminaly Velocity/Fury3, very arcade-like games with an emphasis on flying instead of bipedal movement.

What it ultimately comes down to, is that we disagree on where the boundaries for "FPS" games lie. You say I draw it too far, I say you don't draw it far enough. But because no GamerGod has dispatched his version of Moses to come down and bless us with the Sacred Definitions of Game Genres, we're stuck with arguments like this 'till the cows come home.

Well, that’s the thing. I imagine Astral rag wouldn’t have forgotten descent at all. Mostly because he is very knowledgeable of action FPS of the past. The thing is he brought a more obscure game to the table, the terminator future shock. I haven’t played FS and I don’t know how I would fit that game as an FPS in the sane vein as doom or quake; or if i would think of it as simething very diferent. I for once do not consider system shock 1 a pure FPS, mostly because I felt the game played like a futuristic ultima underworld.

Another take is that if the term FPS had never been coined, I would be completely ok if descent was called a doom type or a doom clone, but mostly due to the timeframe the game was released.

And if one considers the arcade like approach, Mad Dog McCree is an FPS, and also those virtua cop arcade games made by sega.

Also, bringing thief back to the table, it appeared at the same time as halflife, sin, unreal, and with a very similar control scheme. Thief was unique at the time, but at fist glance it was an “FPS”, since it had the same aesthetics and features from its contemporaries. It was not an action game at all. But it was oftem compared to those 1998 FPSs.

Descent was compared to doom and heretic in the same way thief was compared to HL and unreal. Now, in the same vein I take thief out of the equation, I chose to take out descent.

It’s all very subjective, and the irony is that I intended to post about descent as an earlier game than Future Shock. What made me dismiss it was that future shock is more obscure, looks more “traditional” in the sense of the digital foundry video, and the fact that if I had posted, I would probably be discussing against this point of view I’m defending now.

Maybe if I played Future Shock back then, I would feel like I was playing futuristic daggerfall. My opinion here in based mostly on current standards but I can definitely see and fit descent in FPS if I take into account its origins.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

I was gonna just leave this at "we'll agree to disagree" but then I spotted this:

And if one considers the arcade like approach, Mad Dog McCree is an FPS, and also those virtua cop arcade games made by sega.

Here's where you're making a mistake. The genre "FPS" is a sub-genre of gaming. Not because it's a niche part of gaming with few titles (LOL no) but because it has so many definitions attached to it that they form a pretty clear (though again, not exactly defined) image of what kind of game to expect. FPS is a sub-genre within in the "action game" genre, possibly also within another sub-genre of those, called "Shooters". "SHMUPs" are a sister genre of FPS games, but another sister genre I see a reason to mention is "Rail Shooter", a game where you have no control over movement except to choose which corridor the game sends you down, at certain points (your movement is on rails, hence the name) and the goal is just to shoot whatever the game throws at you, which it always does in pre-determined patterns. Mad Dog McCree, Virtua Cop, House of the Dead are the big guns in that sub-genre. And yes, the FPS genre has its own sub-genres now, there's at least "realistic first-person shooters" that try to keep things grounded in reality with realistic physics and weapons and such, and also "team-based multiplayer FPS" like CS:GO, TF2 and Overwatch.

What you're trying to do is lump lots of games into the FPS genre that have no purpose being there, just because the genre has a couple of terms and definitions that apply to whatever game you're thinking of. It's not a catch-all genre where you throw in every game with a first-person perspective. And also, the definitions of genres can and will change with time. Every single adventure game up and until the late 1980s (possibly even a little bit beyond that) was classified as an "Adventure Game" until people saw a need to do a split: "Graphical Adventure" and "Text-based Adventure", or until the better term "Interactive Fiction" was coined. Yet there are still people that refer to classical point 'n' click games as simply "Adventure Games", even though the big irony is that the genre is named after the old 1970s game Adventure, which itself is a text-based game. Those people are not wrong, but they're not exactly right either. And that's where you are.

I don't think anyone has drawn up a tree of gaming genres yet, mainly because it would get Escher-esque far too quickly and probably drive people mad. But that doesn't mean that it isn't there.

 

[Darth Slaughter]

I was gonna just leave this at "we'll agree to disagree" but then I spotted this:

And if one considers the arcade like approach, Mad Dog McCree is an FPS, and also those virtua cop arcade games made by sega.

Here's where you're making a mistake. The genre "FPS" is a sub-genre of gaming. Not because it's a niche part of gaming with few titles (LOL no) but because it has so many definitions attached to it that they form a pretty clear (though again, not exactly defined) image of what kind of game to expect. FPS is a sub-genre within in the "action game" genre, possibly also within another sub-genre of those, called "Shooters". "SHMUPs" are a sister genre of FPS games, but another sister genre I see a reason to mention is "Rail Shooter", a game where you have no control over movement except to choose which corridor the game sends you down, at certain points (your movement is on rails, hence the name) and the goal is just to shoot whatever the game throws at you, which it always does in pre-determined patterns. Mad Dog McCree, Virtua Cop, House of the Dead are the big guns in that sub-genre. And yes, the FPS genre has its own sub-genres now, there's at least "realistic first-person shooters" that try to keep things grounded in reality with realistic physics and weapons and such, and also "team-based multiplayer FPS" like CS:GO, TF2 and Overwatch.

What you're trying to do is lump lots of games into the FPS genre that have no purpose being there, just because the genre has a couple of terms and definitions that apply to whatever game you're thinking of. It's not a catch-all genre where you throw in every game with a first-person perspective. And also, the definitions of genres can and will change with time. Every single adventure game up and until the late 1980s (possibly even a little bit beyond that) was classified as an "Adventure Game" until people saw a need to do a split: "Graphical Adventure" and "Text-based Adventure", or until the better term "Interactive Fiction" was coined. Yet there are still people that refer to classical point 'n' click games as simply "Adventure Games", even though the big irony is that the genre is named after the old 1970s game Adventure, which itself is a text-based game. Those people are not wrong, but they're not exactly right either. And that's where you are.

I don't think anyone has drawn up a tree of gaming genres yet, mainly because it would get Escher-esque far too quickly and probably drive people mad. But that doesn't mean that it isn't there.

I love the idea of a tree of gaming. In fact, people do that a lot of times with the 3d engines. In any case, we would finally se if a modern game have the "DNA" of a previous iteration (I hate when developers talk about DNA in games).

On the subject, I mentioned Mad Dog and virtua cop because you said Arcade gameplay style while describing the FPS subgenre, so I was actually mocking you. I do not consider these games FPSs. But I understand, since I was mentioning a lot of games that would fit your definition of FPS but actually aren't.

They're rail shooters yes, and their origins do not come from the traditional FPS design, like descent is, but if you talk about today's standards and accept sub-genres, Descent is now considered a 6DoF. I know that 6DoF comes directly from the FPS. It's a niche subgenre and very specific. Ane we already have a significant number of games that descent became it's own doom. 6DoF is a descent-type or a descent-clone.

As I see now, I'd say that the 6Dof is a new branch in that tree that came from the shooters subgenre of the action genre. I'd call it a sister of FPS rather than child, but even if one conmsiders it a subgenre of an FPS, the term 6DoF is the dominant and defining one.

 

[Ash]

Duke Nukem 3D's AI wasn't exactly mindblowing, still somewhat behaviourally simple overall, but it was pretty decent, noteworthy and important. You got the enforcers which jump over obstacles in their path, trooper captains and their teleportation, pig cops lying down/ducking under your shots, troopers and their jetpacks that go from walking to flying around, and will jetpack up to reach you if you are at a elevated position. They open doors, they pathfind...relatively well, they can be found taking a shit on a toilet and other such cool scripting, and most importantly, they're doing all this while moving around a 3D world. It's a lot easier to do AI in 2D. Name a 3D real time game from 1996 or before with AI that advanced? I've not played one that I recall.

I just replayed Nukem 3D again recently. Game kicks serious ass.

Also the Octabrain is one of the coolest enemies ever conceived. It was a very nice touch of the DukePlus mod to give them telekinesis.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

As I see now, I'd say that the 6Dof is a new branch in that tree that came from the shooters subgenre of the action genre. I'd call it a sister of FPS rather than child

And you'd be wrong.

I'll be honest, I didn't even know there were sperglords that considered 6DoF to be a sub-genre of gaming, so I did some research. Every game that can lay a claim to this definition is a first-person perspective game, of which a few allow for third-person perspective. So if 6DoF is a gaming genre to begin with (because I'm still not sold on that) then it is a sub-genre of FPS games.

What I think is the case with 6DoF is the same case as with Metroidvania games, which some claim is a gaming sub-genre, but I don't. It's more of an element of game design, a concept that can be used in various games of all kinds, not just side-scrolling platformers. The Wikipedia definition for Metroidvania games is a long-ass one, but after reading it I can name Ultima VII: The Black Gate as an example of a Metroidvania game. Ultima VII is not a side-scrolling platformer like Metroid or Castlevania, but it ticks off all the other items on the checklist. But seeing as Ultima VII is generally considered a RPG, it can't be both an RPG and a Metroidvania game... can it? Want another bizarre Metroidvania title? Alien: Isolation.

It's like the thing with Rogue-likes. When does one draw the line with games that are clearly trying to be like Rogue, and games that only employ aspects of Rogue, most notably the randomly generated dungeon levels, just to name an example? For the former there's a specific gaming sub-genre, but you can't always say that randomly/procedurally generated gameplay automatically makes a game a Rogue-like, and then shove it into that genre.

See, this is the reason why no one has come up with The Definitive Genres of Gaming yet - some things are being categorized incorrectly and skew the Big Picture.

 

[Parsifarka]

I'm honestly disappointed about not being able to play the game exclusively with keyboard; for the most part the autoaim works well enough (except for stairs) but many objects can only be interacted using the mouse to face the proper angle -I was stuck for a while with the first locked door, unable to use the key panel after collecting the card until I decided to swallow the decline and move the mouse after several reloads thinking it was a bug. If they really want to bring back the BUILD experience this must be fixed
Really, this kind of FPS gets ridicously easy with free look.

 

[JBro]

Mouselook was invented in that very era, you fucking sperg.

 

[Parsifarka]

Mouselook was invented in that very era, you fucking sperg.

To play against other humans, not to spoil the single player mode abusing the AI. It's nothing far from cheating. Then some retards complain about old shooters not being as challenging as they expected.
Is Wolfenstein 3D supposed to be played with mouse too? Where's the limit?

What about M&M6, is it acceptable to play it with mouselook? Has the Codex developed such tolerance for self inflicted decline?

 

[Ash]

If a game has mouselook support and is super easy that's no correlation, no fault of mouselook. It's a design problem, not a hardware problem. Or someone modding in mouselook to a game that was originally designed without it, which isn't the case for build engine games.

And people complain about console sticks out of ignorance (they're worse than mouse, but a fuckton better than keyboard looking)...

Mouselook/freelook isn't decline.
Keyboard looking only continued to be commonly optionally supported into the 2000s because of some gamer's inability to perceive incline and stuck with what they knew.
If you find the games too easy, mod them. You can remove aim assist, get improved AI, get user maps with tougher map design, all meaningful stuff. All meaningful difficulty increases rather than control convolution attempting to run and gun 360 degrees and in three dimensions with a keyboard :/

 

[LESS T_T]

Btw Early Access is now also available on GOG: https://af.gog.com/game/ion_maiden?as=1649904300

 

[sparq_beam]

Mouselook was invented in that very era, you fucking sperg.

To play against other humans, not to spoil the single player mode abusing the AI. It's nothing far from cheating. Then some retards complain about old shooters not being as challenging as they expected.
Is Wolfenstein 3D supposed to be played with mouse too? Where's the limit?

What about M&M6, is it acceptable to play it with mouselook? Has the Codex developed such tolerance for self inflicted decline?

I don't know about Wolf 3D, but I was curious about how people played Doom, and found out that the readme recommended using the mouse:

TIP: When you're comfortable playing the game, try using the
keyboard and the mouse simultaneously. The mouse provides
fine control for aiming your weapon (allowing you to
smoothly rotate right and left) while the keyboard permits
you to activate the many useful functions of the game.

Of course, this is only horizontal mouselook. That being said, I'm not sure that you were expected to circle-strafe. You technically can if you use the sidestep keys ("," and "." by default), but I don't know if that was actually done when the game came out. I use something similar to the original controls, so I end up just sidestepping small distances to dodge projectiles, and then aim at the target.

When I played Blood I used horizontal mouselook and home/end to look up/down, which happens often to aim the throwables.

[1] http://www.classicdoom.com/doominfo.htm (this is for 1.8, but I checked in the original shareware and the same tip is there)

 

[schru]

Wolfenstein 3D did include mouse support from the beginning, and Duke Numen 3D had full mouse-look, though it may not have been on by default.

Only circle-strafing might be something of an exploit in those games as the keys dedicated to it were placed inconveniently far, I think, and Alt as the strafing modifier for the turn left/right keys also affected the mouse.

 

[LESS T_T]

Visual history of Shelly "Bombshell" Harrison: http://steamcommunity.com/games/562860/announcements/detail/1676902239539040353

NSFW: A visual history of Shelly "Bombshell" Harrison

As many of you know, Bombshell is not a new character.

She was originally concieved back in the mid '90s, before the development of Duke Nukem Forever began. Back then, she started her journey towards a character as fan fiction in the Command & Conquer universe.

Not quickly thereafter, she developed into a new character for Duke Nukem Forever, but never made it into the final game.

Originally, she was going to be based off Pamela Anderson, from the movie "Barb Wire". A counterpart to Duke Nukem, with a heavy emphasis on her attitude towards Duke.

Spoiler

1997

The first concepts of Shelly were drawn in 1997, and had a heavy emphasis on sexualization, which was not uncomon the mid-nineties, although a bit embarrasing looking back with 2018 glasses;

1998

In 1998 Bombshell was re-drawn again, this time by Dan Panosian. The design was slightly more stylized, but still with a heavy emphasis on sexualization.

1999 - 2001

In 1999 - 2001, she got another range of designs by Paul Richards, with some having a closer resembelance to the current version of Shelly. For instance, in one instance she had a bionic arm, while in another she was a bomb defusal expert. This was still the late '90s, with an over-the-top emphasis on sexualization (How far we've come!).

2000


Paul Richards also did a few colorized version of his Bombshell artwork in 2000:

2003

In 2003 we hired the legendary artist Feng Zhu to design a new interpretation of Bombshell.

This iteration was way less sexualized, with a more tactical look:

2009

2009 marked the final appearance of Bombshell in a game related to Duke Nukem. At this point she was still meant to be included in Duke Nukem Forever, but was shortly scrapped afterwards.

In this interation, Bombshell, was simply an EDF Soldier:

2015

2015 marked the year of the return of Bombshell - This time in her very first appearance in a game.

In terms of her design, we had decided to take her in a completely new direction. We wanted to scrap the emphasis on sexualization, and instead create something brand new. We kept some old ideas, like her bionic arm, and her background as a bomb defusal expert:

2018

And here we are!

In 2018, Bombshell returned to her FPS roots, starring in her very own First Person Shooter - Ion Maiden. As a prequel to Bombshell, before she lost her arm in the Washington Incident, we wanted to focus more on a different set or armor for the character. At this point, Bombshell is still working for the GDF, which we wanted to emphasize in her new look:

Someone asked a question in the comments, and 3DR Founder Scott Miller gave this reply:


>>> Any information on the standalone Bombshell game 3D Realms was working on in the 90s? <<<

Sure. We had a small internal team, lead by engine coder, Billy Zelsnack and his brother, Jason, who were working on a fully 3D game in 1997, starring a female hero. It was going to be a war game, and your female character was a bit of a female Rambo. The two Zelsnack's had the idea of calling the game Bitch, and I put thought into coming up with a better name.

A month or two later, while watching the film, Barbwire, the ending credits had a generic "bombshell" character, and it immediately clicked that Bombshell could be a very cool name for the game, in place of Bitch.

The Zelsnack brothers left 3D Realms soon after, though, to start their own studio, and that's when I convinced my partner George that Bombshell should have a role in Duke Nukem Forever, with the idea of establishing her in that game, then giving her a spin-off game of her own.

 

[Jacob]

The two Zelsnack's had the idea of calling the game Bitch

 

[Maggot]

The first iteration was the best and the 2015 version is disgusting.

 

[Irata]

I hate this game because they purposely named it that so that it would look like Iron Maiden. Where's Eddie!?!

 

[Darth Roxor]

muh embarrassing over-sexualisation

the fuck

 

[Ash]

Eh, I'd imagine it is a bit embarassing looking like the average stereotypical game dev dweeb and creating hyper-sexualised fantasy characters.
You're still not supposed to give a fuck, I mean it is after all the point of fiction, and I doubt any of the devs were ultra muscular, ultra badass, super cool, all the women love him and holding celebrity status like Duke Nukem himself was either.

 

[HansDampf]

How far we've come.