Dune II: The Building of a Dynasty - Review

Author: Nanaki_Xii Date: May 12 2005 - 22:05 Score: 50 points

The grand-pappy of real-time strategy games was Westwood's original RTS adaptation of Frank Herbert's Dune, the book's war & strife filled basis ported over to a fantastic game, well suited to a fantastic book. Years later, Westwood took the now hideous original and gave it a face lift and some much needed improvements. Many give Command & Conquer the privilege as the game that set the paved road for future RTS games, but Dune II in spirit, was the first.

Dune II is quite a pretty game, there's an overall lack of graininess, it's a very sharp and attractive look. Explosions flare up fantastically, and units are - most of the time- easy to recognize. Despite all that, Dune II is overall a "pretty" game, but it all gets the job done in a satisfying manner, and without any loss to the player's understanding of the action taking place in the battlefield.

The sound in the game is a little better in quality than the graphics, you'll grow to recognize the sounds of tanks exploding and gunfire, allowing you immediately to tell which way the battle is shifting. This allows you to have a finer tuning when it comes to being able to manage all the chaos that'll be happening on-screen.

Later on in the game, a single wave of tanks won't do the job, so knowing the variations in sound will hold a advantage, as the game doesn't provide enough time for you to slowly recollect yourself and once again direct your attention. The sound makes this wonderfully easy though, as each blast or scream sounds distinct in it's own way.

By this time, Dune II's game play wasn't exactly revolutionary, but Westwood did a fine job of keeping it fresh. If you know the C&C formula of control, then there'll be no difficulty adapting to the game's control scheme. The bad thing is, if you aren't a quick learner, expect to find yourself cursing when you deselect a unit accidentally. The C&C interface wasn't exactly praised through the years, so take a quick tip. Left click will select units, but right click won't move them. That's simple twist may cause some frustration in battle, once being new to this myself, I lost quite a few of my first skirmishes deselecting tanks as they strolled into an enemy base. Despite the initial mess with the controls, the interface is clean and easy. Buildings are built with a few mouse clicks, keeping base development at an all time low when it comes to time consumption. One thing that many will be thankful for is the fact that Dune II only has one central resource, Credits. This keeps it mercifully easy, as you don't have to hunt down a variety of elusive materials. The AI is average, it sticks to a formula it was programmed to, and never really changes it's behavior. Though Dune II wasn't exactly original in it's game play, it certainly held a good amount of fun.

If you're an RTS fan there's no reason for you not to collect this treasure. Despite it's age, Dune II still holds a special place in the hearts of RTS fans, and it still manages to please today.

	Title / Type	Submitter	Date
	Review	Nanaki_Xii	May 12 2005

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