"Duke Nukem Forever succeeds by understanding what was great" about the series, says Pitchford

A video featuring Gearbox's Randy Pitchford talking about Duke Nukem Forever has been released.

In it, Pitchford talks about the game's "exaggerated reality," and how he feels "gratified and humbled" to be part of the process in getting the game released. He also reminisces about what was so great about the first game, and how DNF brings those elements to life again.

"Duke Nukem Forever succeeds by understanding what was great [about the previous games], and delivering on a worthy successor to all that was fun," he said. "Of course, all the humor and all the titillation is there, as well as the 'I have to see what is going to happen next,' is all there for us.

"But at the same time, it's a very intelligent game. It balances very satisfactorily pacing between hardcore action and action skill-test gameplay and off to the side of that, we have interactive things like playing with a fully functional pinball machine to working out in Duke Nukem's gym actually lifting weights... all this kind of alternate gameplay on one side and then the discovery of secret and hidden areas and surprises which are tangential."

You can watch the video over on Shacknews, and there's also some gameplay present in it.

Duke Nukem Forever is due out on June 14 in the US and on June 10 everywhere else in the world.