I'm gonna review a very old game. Why? Because recently I got my hands on a bunch of old games that I used to enjoy playing and it was interesting to see how they aged. So, here we go:
D U N E
A beginning is a very delicate time. Now then that it is the year 1992 and the most powerful gaming platform, the PC, equipped with a 386 DX Intel processor and a VGA card is capable of displaying up to 256 colours at the mind-boggingly high resolution of 320x200. Computer games (yes, computer games) are considered a bizarre pastime reserved for the young and the disturbed.
Out of this primordial soup of of proto-games, where almost every game is a new genre, emerges Dune. Loosely based on the very successful book and the not-so-successful movie it puts you in the sand filled shoes of Paul Atreides, a young blah blah blah, you probably know the story already.
Thus, gameplay: Dune is a blend of an adventure game and strategy. The aim is to collect spice (the most valuable substance in the Universe) and fight your enemies off the desert planet Dune. Instead of creating/building/breeding your units you recruit them. To do this you have to fly your aristocratic buttocks in an ornithopter and visit the troops in their homes (sietches), speak to their leaders and hope they'll join your cause. They might, they might not, it depends on how far you've progressed in the game. These troops, spice gatherers by default, can later be trained into prospectors or soldiers. Spice is used as currency which you will need in great quantities: without proper equipment you won't get far and the desert is an indiscriminate executioner.
The adventure part mostly consists of talking to various NPCs, taking them from one place to another for various reasons, uncovering the mysteries of your own palace (secret rooms), and unlocking new abilities (telepathy, the only means of contacting your troops, before that you have to actually go to them and tell them what to do yourself, and riding the sandworm).
Sounds insane? It is, but it works. These elements are nicely balanced out, whenever you're not pushing the plot forward by talking to different people (which is not as boring as it sounds) you're busy managing your troops and resources. The plot can be interesting at times (especially if you're not acquainted with the book). Both elements are simplified but when composed they work like a charm. Yes, composed, not combined. Gameplay is coherent and at no point do you feel that you're playing two different genres (mostly because the producers probably didn't think of their game as a blend of genres).
Visually the game was brilliant. And now... well, it's not painful to look at. If Far Cry is your idea of ancient history the graphics will take time and effort to get used to but you shouldn't feel as if you were looking at a steaming pile of sandworm dung, the visuals lost the flash but the pretty's still there, enclosed within each of 76800 pixels you see.
The music is midi and, surprisingly, it doesn't sound bad. The soundtrack (one of the 1st game soundtracks to be released as a music CD) has a very distinct "organic" SF style which works well with midi. Not everyone likes it but to my (sick, twisted, psychotic) mind it manages to create the mystical alien atmosphere of Dune better than the standard orchestral stuff.
Of course the game's not perfect: it might seem somewhat easy for many players, not necessarily hardcore and to run it on a newer system with the sound working properly you might need to fiddle a bit with a DOS emulator, and apart from the music the game's almost completely silent.
That and playing it might make you feel like a geek.
What the game does have is atmosphere. A kind of raw, undistilled immersion you get in games that were made back when the producers didn't think about immersion. And, believe it or not, gameplay-wise it might actually feel new. Simple, yes, somewhat crude, but still.
If you stumble upon it give it a try. It's certainly worth all the attention it can get.
Note: the game also has a CD version with slightly better looking graphics, clips from the movie Dune and recorded dialogues.
D U N E
A beginning is a very delicate time. Now then that it is the year 1992 and the most powerful gaming platform, the PC, equipped with a 386 DX Intel processor and a VGA card is capable of displaying up to 256 colours at the mind-boggingly high resolution of 320x200. Computer games (yes, computer games) are considered a bizarre pastime reserved for the young and the disturbed.
Out of this primordial soup of of proto-games, where almost every game is a new genre, emerges Dune. Loosely based on the very successful book and the not-so-successful movie it puts you in the sand filled shoes of Paul Atreides, a young blah blah blah, you probably know the story already.
Thus, gameplay: Dune is a blend of an adventure game and strategy. The aim is to collect spice (the most valuable substance in the Universe) and fight your enemies off the desert planet Dune. Instead of creating/building/breeding your units you recruit them. To do this you have to fly your aristocratic buttocks in an ornithopter and visit the troops in their homes (sietches), speak to their leaders and hope they'll join your cause. They might, they might not, it depends on how far you've progressed in the game. These troops, spice gatherers by default, can later be trained into prospectors or soldiers. Spice is used as currency which you will need in great quantities: without proper equipment you won't get far and the desert is an indiscriminate executioner.
The adventure part mostly consists of talking to various NPCs, taking them from one place to another for various reasons, uncovering the mysteries of your own palace (secret rooms), and unlocking new abilities (telepathy, the only means of contacting your troops, before that you have to actually go to them and tell them what to do yourself, and riding the sandworm).
Sounds insane? It is, but it works. These elements are nicely balanced out, whenever you're not pushing the plot forward by talking to different people (which is not as boring as it sounds) you're busy managing your troops and resources. The plot can be interesting at times (especially if you're not acquainted with the book). Both elements are simplified but when composed they work like a charm. Yes, composed, not combined. Gameplay is coherent and at no point do you feel that you're playing two different genres (mostly because the producers probably didn't think of their game as a blend of genres).
Visually the game was brilliant. And now... well, it's not painful to look at. If Far Cry is your idea of ancient history the graphics will take time and effort to get used to but you shouldn't feel as if you were looking at a steaming pile of sandworm dung, the visuals lost the flash but the pretty's still there, enclosed within each of 76800 pixels you see.
The music is midi and, surprisingly, it doesn't sound bad. The soundtrack (one of the 1st game soundtracks to be released as a music CD) has a very distinct "organic" SF style which works well with midi. Not everyone likes it but to my (sick, twisted, psychotic) mind it manages to create the mystical alien atmosphere of Dune better than the standard orchestral stuff.
Of course the game's not perfect: it might seem somewhat easy for many players, not necessarily hardcore and to run it on a newer system with the sound working properly you might need to fiddle a bit with a DOS emulator, and apart from the music the game's almost completely silent.
That and playing it might make you feel like a geek.
What the game does have is atmosphere. A kind of raw, undistilled immersion you get in games that were made back when the producers didn't think about immersion. And, believe it or not, gameplay-wise it might actually feel new. Simple, yes, somewhat crude, but still.
If you stumble upon it give it a try. It's certainly worth all the attention it can get.
Note: the game also has a CD version with slightly better looking graphics, clips from the movie Dune and recorded dialogues.
