strategy game, though, with my first
game ending in less than four hours.
And it wasn’t mindless: I got the
sense that I could play Spice Wars
significantly differently in control of
another faction or if I was gunning
for a different victory condition. It
took me until deep into my first
game to start understanding the
depth of many of its mechanics and
how much more I could’ve done
with them, knowledge I’m looking
forward to exploiting in another run.
As the Fremen I was able to keep
my armies healthy in harsh desert
conditions and summon worms to
travel vast distances, but I was
particularly unpopular in the political
Landsraad council, so I spent far too
long ignoring the monthly votes that
granted factions major advantages. I
focused on growing my military and
economic tech trees and missed out
on how powerful espionage could be,
too. If I’d devoted more spies to the
Atreides house, I may have been able
to assassinate Duke Leto before he’d
successfully installed himself as
governor and clinched a politicalBELOW: The map view
highlights points of
interest and special
resources in each
territory.that spice, braving sandworms and
massive storms and treacherous
spies. If I’m gonna go out I want to
end my rule like Tony Montana,
mountains of spice glistening on my
impressively over-sized desk.
Dune: Spice Wars is the first
videogame based on Frank Herbert’s
books in two decades, and it’s an
ambitious project for developer Shiro
Games. When I think 4X, I think
enormous games like Civilization and
Total War made by hundreds of
people, packed with so many menus
and tooltips I’m intimidated before
I’ve even left the title screen. Shiro
Games, meanwhile, has a team of
only 22 working on this new 4X
strategy
adaptation of
Dune. (Shiro
developed its
breakout game,
Northgard, with
a team of just
nine or so devs).
Spice Wars
launched in
Early Access at
the end of April, with a single-player
mode for now and open-ended plans
for future growth.HOW YOU DUNE?
“We need to get trust and a first
wave of feedback from players: what
they like, what they don’t like, what
they feel is balanced,” says creative
director Sebastien Vidal. “Everybody
says, ‘We’re going to listen to our
players and do stuff that matters to
them,’ but [for us] it’s really the case- we want to have that feedback and
develop in the direction that the
community wants to see.” Vidal tells
me that when the studio released
Northgard into Early Access in 2017,
players surprised them by asking for
multiplayer first, so that became
their focus. Shiro Games did
eventually add a campaign, but it
came much later. For Spice Wars
co-op and PvP are likely going to be
the first features to arrive in Early
Access, along with an economic
victory condition, though players
could again surprise them.
Spice Wars is at the moment a
somewhat dry (forgive me) 4X game,
missing the personality that the best
of the genre deliver through chatty
leaders, narrative events, or ample
flavour text. Last
year’s Old World
was a sterling
example, with
some events tied
directly to the
personality traits
of your leader
and others
pulled from real
history. Spice
Wars is recognisably Dune because of
the desert and sandworms and
ornithopters, but it’s missing that
extra layer of personality.
I crave a deeper event system
that draws from Dune lore, like
political snafus involving snubbed
Bene Gesserit witches or my entire
civilisation suffering a massive
psychic blow when the Sardaukar
show up to kick my ass.SPICE WORLD
As it stands Spice Wars is
refreshingly breezy for this style of“WE NEED TO GET
TRUST AND A FIRST
WAVE OF FEEDBACK
FROM PLAYERS”Dune: Spice Wars
COVER FEATURE