Dune Spice Wars Proven: let's conquer the Arrakis desert!
– Reviews News
It used to be a tradition that after a box office blockbuster movie was released, a game based on that cinematic experience hits the various platforms. From the most anonymous titles to “must haves” like the King Kong video game or those of Batman, the list of links is long.
In the case of Dune, it was not easy to imagine how the blockbuster directed by Denis Villeneuve could be transposed into a video game, given the way in which the themes it addresses are treated. Unexpectedly, however, Shiro Games managed to transpose the essence of this magnificent universe into a strategic key, pulling off a difficult undertaking.
Dune Spice War it looks like a very traditional but fun management software, even for those who are not akin to this type of video game, which usually turns out to be complex and annoying considering the many things to do and manage.
From the suggestive main menu, the player can set out to conquer Arrakis and its precious spice, being able to choose his own faction and, later, two advisors. And it's a pleasure to reunite with the characters from the film and see them play a key role in our campaign.
Classic, but not obvious, is the presence of bonuses and maluses which, depending on the selection, modify the experience such as the choice of difficulty and the size of the map, or the possibility of deciding which factions to meet or not.
Our main outpost can be upgraded to increase our power over conquered areas.
DUNE Spice Wars is very intuitive from a management point of view. From the beginning, we must send our explorers to find places where it is possible to extract the spice, cities that control that particular territory, points of interest from which to obtain information, etc. Our task will be to annex a population center to our domain, by force or diplomacy.
DUNE Spice War
- Developer: Shiro Games
- Publisher: Funcom, Shiro Games
- Availability: April 26, 2022 – PC
- Fourth row
After completing this phase, you can start the construction of the most important buildings to obtain resources, expand and fortify the army or increase statistics useful for the political sphere. Obviously, to accomplish all this it will take time and time in Dune Spice Wars is essential, precisely because our objective is to collect as many spices as possible through the harvesters at our disposal, in order to comply with Imperial orders and to make deliveries for the time.
However, it's not just the time limits that worry Dune Spice Wars players because the game has quite a number of random events, also depending on the difficulty chosen, which must be faced in order not to suffer consequences that would harm our hegemony. . From sandstorms and Fremen attacks, to clashes with other factions, to the fearsome Shai-Hulud, the giant desert worm that will try to destroy the harvesters at work on the spice fields, unexpected events you will face.
In short, the world of Dune is really difficult, challenging the player whenever possible and creating a really interesting level of challenge for those who want to test themselves, but accept the consequences.
Each conquered city can have its own troops to defend itself from possible attacks.
If on the one hand it is necessary to face natural or planetary threats, from a political point of view it will be necessary to maintain the morale of the population at the highest to retain the votes and therefore have more influence. It was therefore difficult to find new ways to approach the other factions of the game, thus benefiting the trade. Or discover already occupied towns and take possession of them to weaken rival houses.
Maintaining control requires not only diplomacy but also cunning, cunning and strategic superiority. In any period of time, we will be able to recruit an undercover agent to earn a bonus on the knowledge of opponents. Weakening them from within and discovering the location of other cities under their control is an interesting mechanic, but the Council is even more so.
In this case, each time the game warns us, we will have to participate in a session in which to vote for a certain procedure that will bring advantages or disadvantages. With our house we could both support the collective will and oppose it, but in this case losing diplomacy points.
Once we have reached a certain level of hegemony, we will be able to expand our base with new buildings and there we found ourselves facing a new obstacle, namely the costs, on average high in relation to our income, which Also seemed good to us given the fairly high number of settlements and structures at our disposal.
The map is very detailed and gradually shows all the discovered areas with all the points of interest.
Another problem is related to the way this title is posed towards the player. In fact, despite trying to be intuitive, Dune Spice Wars has proven to be cryptic in some of its mechanics, one of them being the Council. There is no real explanation related to how the vote is played, nor how to earn and spend consents.
Dune Spice Wars is overall a fun and interesting experience, which demonstrates Shiro Games' prowess in developing management titles. The way the developers have managed to transpose the film into a strategic film, respecting both the cinematographic and literary work, is certainly very pleasant. However, some improvements still need to be made to the ergonomics of the game and we are curious to see if the developers will be able to smooth out the few edges that we noted during our test.
SOURCE: Reviews News
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