Late yesterday, ShackNews posted a report on a possible employee exodus at Duke Nukem Forever developer 3D Realms. The still unreleased Duke Nukem game was first announced almost a decade ago (April 1997) and Shack speculated on the fate of the title in light of recent departures from 3D Realms.

According to the report, since last December Scott Alden, Will Bate, Brian Cozzens, Kyle Davis, Andy Hanson, Keith Schuler, and Charlie Wiederhold have all moved on. Several of these employees had headed up crucial game systems such as physics, animation, and rendering. Shack further reported that Cozzens, Davis, Schuler, and Wiederhold are now working for Brothers in Arms developer Gearbox Software.

Today 3D Realms President George Broussard responded on Shack's message boards, insisting that development is going full steam ahead on DNF but not outright denying the departure of certain personnel. "Physics and animation systems are virtually finished and shippable. It's simply maintenance and polish from here on out. We haven't needed to make substantial changes to those systems in months. The changes we have made, were made without great effort," he said, then adding, "Things are never as bleak as they appear, as is often the case when you simply have one side of the story."

Later on, 3D Realms webmaster Joe Siegler downplayed the apparent departures on 3D Realms' own forums. "There's honestly nothing to be concerned about. People leave. People come. There's staff on the project you don't know about. You know some, you don't know most. There's truly nothing to worry about. I know from your end it would seem bad, and if I wasn't still working here and knew more, I'd probably feel the same way," he said. "I'm not worried about my paycheck."

Siegel continued, "It's internal business - all employee departures and comings have always been that way. This is nothing new. People have left before, IT IS THE NATURE OF THIS BUSINESS. It's the way it goes.

"I'm sure people will spin my remarks by saying 'He's the company guy, he's gonna say that stuff', but I was out to dinner with George and some other guys tonight, and listening to them, I'm not worried in the least. You shouldn't be either."

So there you have it, straight from the horse's mouth. We might actually see DNF one day, and although it appears strange that several important team members have moved on when a big project is supposedly nearing completion, we "shouldn't worry" about any of the departures from the company.