Duke Nukem: Under Construction

Not with Duke's can-do attitude!

Right away, there's a slot for the Robohand and a green key door. The green door I can understand, but use of the Robohand seems relatively pointless since it isn't like you can get rid of it. There's a trick that I don't think the game actually says, where you can press up while hanging on something to climb up it. No going back down though. Once you get past that, it's simple, but annoying. Lots of platforms with hidden flame jets. This is Broussard's doing, I just know it. There's a roof you can hang from, and fun fact, if you get hit while hanging from something, you get knocked to the floor. Which is very high up if you're in this area. That's basically the level, outside of a fall where you get blown back and forth by fans. Naturally, there's a secret here. 

 The Bubble City of Dr. Proton. Which starts you off in a hole where when you climb up, enemies and hazards fall down. Despite knowing this, I got hit by them a lot, so either I suck at this game or this is really annoying. This makes itself clear that you will need a lot of keys early on, but said keys are not particularly forthcoming. I manage to find another computer card, guarded by flame jets, which doesn't help me yet. So, there's some trick I haven't noticed yet. And it turns out that the reason is that the computer card is used on a down arrow. That isn't annoying...

This level is big, so big there's just a massive amount you don't need to ever see. It's worth it just for the two health refills. What you actually have to go through is a sort of factory area, which isn't too tricky. What is tricky is a spot with two flame jets and a nuclear beam you have to take out. The only place you can shoot is right in front of the jets, and did you know that touching the beam is death? What was I expecting anyway? At this point the level is mostly typical, a few side areas, the usual go where indicated and gather up points.

Then Doctor Proton shows up, looking like Doctor Robotnik. He goes around in a U pattern, stand below it and jump up and shoot at him when he's waiting at the top, and he dies quickly enough.

What, nobody noticed Doctor Proton smoothing out the surface of the moon?

We get a weird little level outro, and then there's the usual speech. This won't stop him, I'll go after you. Also, moonbase, Duke really loves returning to moonbases. Onto Episode 2. The intro is the usual back and forth.

I see the north-eastern part of America and the British Isles have sunk into the sea.

To start with, this level is wide, expansive, fairly easy. Enemies approach in small numbers and traps are rare. Health items are so plentiful it's practically impossible to go anywhere without accidentally using one. I like it. There's a cleverly laid out secret near the start, if you notice that a hole near the start has a floor once you go past it, you can find an elevator which will allow you to reach some points and health.

The way this level is laid out does result in some slight issue. The top half is nice, lots of points items, tricky jumps and the one large group of enemies. Which makes it seem like the way out. The way out is, if you go there by slowly climbing down this area with a big pit, hidden. It's something that just looks like a hole to the bottom floor, which I already came up from without having noticed that there were more floors.

This level is weird, basically a series of Xs going on unto the top, sides and bottom. Carefully jump on individual blocks, with missing either resulting in a little progress lost or a lot of progress lost. It's an interesting concept, somewhat ruined by the keys basically just being at the bottom, then going through a series of doors on the sides. It's basically all but impossible to see the entire level because of this setup, but at least the way out is simple enough.

Find the Robohand says the level introduction text. Go up a giant elevator shaft, says the level. You better believe that the game is making the most of its verticality here. Only, it's a long ride up, then a long climb down. There are also certain points that funnel you back here, which isn't entirely annoying. There are two secrets attached to this shaft, one if you find your way back in from elsewhere, and another on the way up. One of the walls is destructible and has another blaster.

The actual level isn't much to talk about, just towers where you have to use elevators to climb up vaguely designed buildings. It's haphazard and annoying to go through, with the Robohand in some random room, and the eventual activation of it seeming just as random.

"You might find that the next level is too windy for you...!" What is that the three dots and then an exclaimation mark trying to convey? Waiting, then sudden surprise? Doesn't really work in a between level hint. There's no wind, just long jumps. So long they go off the screen, and then you go expecting another platform only to start free-falling. Outside of that big wide open area, there's another labyrinth. Interestingly, there's a section near the exit that technically requires a key to enter, but because the exit of this section is within normal jumping range, you can see the other side without having reached it first.

Another maze level. This one has the added bonus of having a conveyor belt full of mines. This is about all that's interesting about this level, it's another big maze, albeit one that's mostly straightforward once you know two tricks. The conveyor belt full of mines is optional, and you need to get the jump boots to win this one. After that, it's mostly going through the same passages hoping to eventually find the exit.

An ancient underground lunar city. Beware of the snake techbot. I don't know what it is, but I see another one of those segmented worm robots. Little late to warn me about that one, boys. Then again, I can't blame them, I don't have anything worth talking about in regards to this level.

The between level hint tells me to find the grappling hooks. This level is simple enough. It's set up like a construction site and makes decent use of the verticality of the game. Even if it is basically just up, down, up, down, up. If it weren't for the requirements of both the Robohand and the grappling hooks, this level would have been a lot better earlier, since outside of a part near the start where you can get blind-sided, it's a cakewalk. I don't know if I didn't notice this before, but the game has two backgrounds depending on where in the level you are. It's cool.

Mercury Mines, which is about the same as the last level. Dangerous start, then easy. In this case, you start at the bottom and your two choices of getting out involve going past a mine at the edge of a platform or past a moving flame on a small platform. That said, it has one element that's weird, the key is easy enough to find, but the door is quite tricky to reach.

Next level starts off with an elevator maze. Remember, elevators always return to the bottom the second you jump off, and it is somewhat slow going up them. Further, Duke starts going down the second he hits the ceiling. Unless it's a climbable one. But quickly it's out into a glorious open section. I stumble upon a door and start looking for a key. I find it, but not before Doctor Proton brags about how Duke will never escape his next maze. Great, I think...only that's the end of the level.

The final level of this episode. It's a conveyor belt maze. This is quite possibly the most tedious concept for a maze possible. Do one thing wrong and it's entirely possible you'll get sent back to the start. Take the wrong path, and you might end up wasting time only for points items. I don't even need useful items at this point, I have everything. But that's just the first part. The second part is more reasonable, just climb over the usual single block things in the sky. The trickiest part is a blind jump, you really just drop down, but you can't know that without failing first.

Doctor Proton is the exact same boss fight, only...actually the last one was over spikes. You're on a single block in the air, maybe? Whatever, I just kept blasting him and he died quicker than last time. No joke, the second I get on his level and start firing, he doesn't even get a real chance to defend himself. That's worse than the mechs throughout the regular level.

Doctor Proton is remarkably calm talking to someone who looks and sounds like he's going to slowly torture him to death.

There's another ending sequence where he goes from the moon back to Earth, where he shall go into the future to build up his robot army more. Because he had a time machine randomly placed, which I assumed was a joke, in a level in episode 1. Next time, Duke kicks Proton's ass for the third time. Will we see new enemies? Will Proton find a new way of attacking Duke? Will I learn to stop asking questions I already know the answer will be no?

This Session: 3 hours 00 minutes

Total Time: 5 hours 25 minutes