The Duke Nukem 3D Screen Saver & Entertainment Pack was published by FormGen in 1996. It was sold as a standalone box, but it is included in the "goodies" folder as part of any standard installation of Duke Nukem 3D: Atomic Edition. It has also been included as part of various expansion packs and compilations. However, the boxed version is considered a rare collector's item and has been valued in hundreds of US dollars.
Contents
All content borrows in-game assets from Duke Nukem 3D. According to the back cover of the box, the pack includes:
- 5 animated screen savers
- "Body Parts" showers the user's desktop with enemy corpses from the game
- "Carnage Meter" displays an EDF news feed, with statistics on the havoc caused by Duke Nukem
- "Exploding Stuff" slowly spawns exploding items all over the user's desktop, covering it in black ash
- "Desktop Rampage" spawns enemies to blast their weapons at the user's desktop, covering it in black ash
- "Shooting Gallery" shows a first-person view of Duke firing his weapon at enemies and objects on the desktop
- 25 wallpaper images
- 16 interactive jigsaw puzzles
- 25 sound clips for customizing your desktop theme
- 16 MIDI music tracks from the game
- 50 in-game screenshots that can be made into more desktop wallpapers or a slideshow screen saver
- Optional password protection module that requires a password before exiting the screen saver
- "Hilarious titallating (sic) surprises, just like in the game. Includes a bypass option for parental control."
- Compatibility with the built-in Windows theme customization utility
Leaked Firefly Trooper
The boxed version is particularly noteworthy for featuring artwork on the back cover of the box that contains three outdated enemy sprites from early prototypes of Duke Nukem 3D.
First, a sprite of the Enforcer wearing red armor can be found near the center of the back cover. However, this sprite was already well-known from numerous promotional screenshots from the May 1995 prototype. It even appeared in early prints of the official manual that were included inside the box with commercial sales of Duke Nukem 3D.
Second, a Pig Cop in the bottom-left corner has the word "POLICE" printed on the back of its uniform, instead of "L.A.R.D." The earliest known images of the Pig Cop (such as this one) have "L.A.R.D." printed on the uniform, which is consistent with the commercial release. This unused sprite, which also appears in other pre-release screenshots, suggests 3D Realms may have at one time considered censoring the Pig Cop but ultimately decided against it.
Third and most significant, an unused alternate sprite for the Assault Trooper can be found in the bottom-right corner. To date, there are no other known images of this sprite that predate the 2016 release of Duke Nukem 3D: 20th Anniversary World Tour, when the sprite was repurposed to create the Firefly Trooper.
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