How Gearbox Ended up with Duke Nukem Forever

Since some politicians somewhere will be complaining about the depravity of Duke Nukem Forever at some point, you might as well know how Gearbox Software ended up with the rights to the game. You may recall, as original creator 3DRealms went bankrupt last year it had a disagreement with Take Two as well and ended up in court - mostly due to investments the publisher made in anticipation of eventually releasing the game.. at some point.

Obviously this left 3DRealms in a bad spot, and it knew it had to do something - and to keep the dream alive. After all, when you develop a game for ten years you want to prove the naysayers wrong when they say that it will never see the light of day. So 3DRealms ended up doing the best thing that it could do: selling the franchise to someone. So that is how Gearbox ended up with Duke Nukem Forever. But in talking to Joystiq at PAX last week, we learn that 3DRealms was not approached by the Brothers in Arms creators; instead it sought out Gearbox - hand-picked them in fact - to take the franchise over. Randy Pitchford, who spent late last week promoting the game, explained more on how it ended up with Duke:

"I didn't buy it from [3D Realms]," Pitchford said. "They sold it to me."

In a press release announcing the acquisition of the IP, 3DRealms' Scott Miller corroborated Pitchford's story:

Gearbox was handpicked as the new home for Duke Nukem because of their continued passion, commitment and long-time heritage with the brand and 3D Realms.

Pitchford and company have been working on the game since 2009. He also told Joystiq that the game's creator, Alan Blum, is working for the Gearbox:

"He's on the 10th floor with his team."

The new Duke is the old Duke: rude, crude, sexist, bad attitude, etc. While that might be music to Duke fans' ears, it also means that it could end up being a serious target of the mainstream media, advocacy groups and politicians who think they have nothing better to do..

Source: Joystiq