As Lee stated, looks like the aftermath is going to be as drawn out as the actual development process. As you probably know, Duke Nukem Forever publisher Take-Two has sued 3D Realms, now shut down but loosely tied to Apogee, over the fact that their game never ever came out. As recompense, Take-Two wants their $12 million spent on publishing rights back, and the original code and assets for the game. Scott Miller, co-founder of 3D Realms, made some brief little posts on Shacknews that shed a little bit of light on some of Take-Two’s allegations. Checking the guy’s post history, it’s clear he’s 1) legit, and 2) been posting for quite a while. One claim was that Take-Two offered to buy the IP rights to Duke for $30 million, but turned it down. Miller denies it saying, “We would have taken this offer without hesitation.” (note about the links, you have to scroll down a bit to see the actual posts).

The more prominent one, though, is his response to the alleged $12 million that Take-Two spent for publishing rights. “We didn’t get a penny of that money. This, along with so much else, is 100% spin, being eaten up by those who have no clue whatsoever. But, we cannot talk yet. We will, soon…”

Officially, Take-Two gave that $12 million to Infogrames in 2000, who had held the publishing rights at the time, and that money was strictly for publishing the game. None of it funded development, which has been completely self-funded by 3D Realms except for a small grant in the beginning of development from GT Interactive (later bought out by Infogrames).

Who’s right? Who knows. All this legaleze is exactly the kind of thing Duke Nukem would’ve fired a lot of guns at. A shame. But either way, it’s looking less and less likely that this game will ever truly exist. We’ll keep you posted regardless.