Dune: Spice Wars
PREVIEW
I got to see Spice Wars’ blend of 4X and
RTS gameplay in a hands-off gameplay
demo, and it’s looking very promising.
It included the broad outline of the start of
a singleplayer Dune campaigni as House
Atreides, as the player ventured out from
their single starting territory to
explore the surface of Arrakis.
Dune: Spice Wars shares a lot of
design basics with Shiro’s critically
acclaimed Northgard, an RTS
cantered on capturing and controlling
territories rather than spreading out over
a wide-open map. That works pretty well
with the 4X DNA present in Spice Wars.
Expanses of desert terrain form distinctly-
outlined territories which each contain a
small town. Conquering the town confers
control of the territory, and each section of
desert can be exploited for resources like
Spice for trade, Plascrete for buildings, or
various rare commodities to sell for cash.
Taking territory is just not just about
selecting some troops and marching them
on over like you might’ve done in a
Command & Conquer game. Factions like
the Atreides can diplomatically annex
small towns, but it takes a lot of time. Theycan also roll in the troops, but that’s
expensive and dangerous: the locals put
up a fight, and conquering one town will
set others against you as Fremen bandits
then come to raid your territory. Further,
any troops venturing outside your turf are
automatically on a clock: once they run
out of supplies, they’ll quickly die.
The desert isn’t a homogenous
expanse of sand. Deep Deserts are the
equivalent of oceans in other 4X games,
and foot units there rapidly run out of
supplies and are at risk of sandworm
attacks. Meanwhile, special territories like
the polar ice caps can supply resources
otherwise very hard to get.NO PLACE LIKE CHOAM
Most of Northgard’s resources went
towards building obvious material things.
For that, Spice Wars really just has Solaris,
Plascrete, Manpower, and Water. Truly
taking control of Dune will require clever
use of soft political currencies, in addition
to agents to infiltrate and lobby important
organisations. Meanwhile, your resources
go towards backing up those plays by
expanding your holdings.
Dune is a far more political than
military work of science fiction, and
Spice Wars appears to respect that.
Though the game takes place only on
Arrakis, the politics of the wider
Imperium and its factions are vital to
success. Players will curry favour in the
Landsraad, trying to pass resolutions and
laws that favour themselves over others.
The goal is to be appointed governor of
Dune, but that’s a path they’ll find difficult
if they’re too aggressive in military conflict.
Landsraad favour is just one of the
currencies players can accrue and spend.
Your Authority goes towards pleasing
factions like the Spacing Guild, Bene
Gesserit, Emperor, and others, for which
you get direct rewards. There’s also the
Spice sales and distribution company,
CHOAM, which happily buys up all the
spice you don’t personally hoard – and
you have to hoard some, since the
Emperor also demands a direct tax in it.
Remember: the Spice must flow.
You don’t have to wait long before you
can try some space politics for yourself- Dune: Spice Wars will released as a
Steam Early Access game this spring.
Jonathan Bolding
A
rrakis. Dune. Desert Planet. We’ve seen
it before in books, movies and games, but
the desert planet of Shiro Games’
upcoming Dune: Spice Wars takes its
own approach to the world. While Spice remains
key to gameplay, Shiro’s approach tackles the
broader galaxy of Dune in a way that most prior
games haven’t attempted.We’ll be Dune some spice mining
D U N E :
SPICE WARS
TAKING CONTROL OF DUNE
WILL REQUIRE CLEVER USE OF
SOFT POLITICAL CURRENCIESRELEASE
Spring 2022 (Early Access)DEVELOPER
Shiro GamesPUBLISHER
Funcom, Shiro GamesLINK
dunegames.comNEED TO KNOWFIRST
LOOKThe largest city on
Arrakis is the base
of House Atreides.