Duke Nukem Was Going To Have A Gay Robot Sidekick
While Duke Nukem isn't exactly known for a nuanced portrayal of sexuality, Gearbox boss Randy Pitchford revealed that they originally had plans to push their protagonist out of his comfort zone with a gay robot sidekick. Although they dropped the character from Duke Nukem Forever for now, Pitchford says he's reluctant to give too many details lest they bring the character back at some point. He did mention that the plan was for the robot to ultimately sacrifice himself by exploding an internal nuclear generator to stop an alien threat. While the escapist points out this is a pretty common trope in media, everything else Duke Nukem does is rooted in a million other pop culture cliches, so why should this be any different?
While I don't have 100% confidence that this wouldn't have been an embarrassing disaster (see Pitchford's quote defending Duke's misogyny: "We are in the time when most of our heroes have become pussies. They're emo and everyone's trying to take themselves so seriously."), I'm willing to give them the benefit of the doubt. I know there's at least one real life actual gay working on the game, so at least they would have had a point of reference. For now though, we'll just have to either lament what could have been or be glad we dodged a bullet, depending on your perspective.
Duke Nukem had "gay robot" sidekick [Eurogamer]
Dawdle
Posted to Video Games on 15 May 2011
· Comments (5)
Other stuff like this: duke nukem forever, gay, gearbox, hmmm, randy pitchford
I don't give them the benefit of the doubt. Not into misogyny and misogynists. That they have one gay person working there, too, doesn't mean that person is the font of everything reasonable and social justice-y for gay folks. :)
"We are in the time when most of our heroes have become pussies. They're emo and everyone's trying to take themselves so seriously."
What a load of utter CRAP. Almost every single lead protagonist is a hypermasculine douchebag. Call of Duty, Gears of War, God of War, etc. Not to mention that the modern man has been dumbed down and portrayed as a horrible idiot father. That guy is a moron and I guarantee you that the gay robot character would have been nothing but tired worn out cliches.
@Limeade, thanks for the comment. I wouldn't expect any gay employees to be some sort of sainty homosexual paragon. That's a lot of pressure! I think it's pretty likely they have other gay folks working there, I just pointed out the one guy I was familiar with. Plus Anthony Burch has written thoughtfully about gay issues in the past, at least when he isn't busy hating us.
Pitchford definitely has trouble filtering himself, but I'm personally not going to judge a plot point that doesn't even exist anymore based on a pithy, thoughtless quote.
Duke likes gays. More chicks for him!
Yeah, that gay robot would of been nothing but one big stereotype. Not in a good way. Insert tasteless jokes about butt buddies or having him put his mouth around a phallus object in order to open a door. "All we have to do is blow air into this pipe and it will open the door. THUPER!!!" You can't trust straight guys to make a gay character. All they know about gay people are the jokes they heard about in High School and College. I'm sure there are straight guys out there that can do a gay character right but I don't trust the Duke Nukem (the most manly womanizer in video game character land) team to do it.