Blogs
on April 20, 2026
It’s understandable, albeit unfortunate, why the newest preview didn’t give much of the more MMO elements of the title away simply due to the location of the demo. However, what was clear from my time with the game was that Funcom has deeply leaned into the harsher aspects of Arrakis, with an emphasis on players having to build their character up from nothing . Even basic traversal is difficult at first, and it really captures the feeling of being lost and struggling in the desert post-crash. Though it’s hard, this harshness contributes to future feelings of accomplishment as w
It is "one of the challenges with regular sandbox survival games," Whelan said. "You know, you rub sticks together to make fire. You cut down a tree for a stack of logs. It's a very organic, understandable, relatable thing. In this universe, we just don't have that. And we're not underestimating the intelligence of our players. They can figure this stuff out. They know that there are technologies that are available to th
It’s exciting to hear that Funcom already has ideas for the future of Dune: Awakening. Working with such an established IP is exciting and limited, but Dune has plenty of variety to keep players coming back for ye
Doing so not only gets you access to plenty of additional resources for your journey but also can cut down on traversal time. Many rock formations have caves that you can enter, allowing you to run through the entire structure and stay in the shade. This is a fantastic boon when you're about to die of sunstroke.
Traversing across the sands can attract sandworms that will devour the player, taking all their gear, items, and - if nearby - their vehicles. Dune: Awakening 's sandworms devour and destroy everything, while standard deaths in conventional combat lead to minor losses. It not only helps realize the dangers of Arrakis, but ensures players are mindful of what they are carrying where. The demoist showed us a couple of vehicles players could use, all derived from the Dune franchise obviously, and losing them in such a vast world is no doubt a serious loss, alongside any high-level gear. Players could craft that gear again, but it requires finding the schematic, necessary materials, and so forth. Gaining anything in Dune: Awakening is an investment, and the sandworm can just wipe that all cl
At a high level, Dune Awakening collectibles: Awakening has some very lofty goals. It is a shared open-world survival game , so players can encounter, work with, and compete with others. The game takes players through four stages that Funcom internally refers to as Survive, Protect, Expand, and Control. This is not necessarily hard-defined elements in the game but a description in which the gameplay evolves. Players arrive on the iconic planet of Arrakis, also known as Dune, as a prisoner and must survive its endless sands, beginning the Survive "phase." Here, water is a survival demand and Spice is a rarity; by the Control "phase," players should be able to wield both as resources of political influence in endgame content, player trades, and so fo
While we were introduced to a couple of ranged weapons, all of which use darts to fit into Dune 's lore, there was only one melee weapon: a knife. Fitting again to the lore, it serviced an approachable melee combat style where three hits would stun an enemy, where parries would stun enemies, and melee just requires repetitive hits until the enemy is down. If enemies are using a shield, then the only way to defeat them is to stun them, then use the Slowblade technique to push through the shield with the knife, eventually defeating them that way. Ranged weapons are ineffective against shielded enemies, but they are useful when dealing with a handful of enemies at a time. Even when delving into the dungeon, however, it's worth noting that we never had to fight more than 4, maybe 5 enemies at a t
And Lynch’s strange film isn't being ignored either. "Lynch tried to grapple [with] a lot of the strange weirdness of the license, which is something which we don't want to ignore, we don't want to forget. That's part of the uniqueness of the world, and it's something we just want to keep on adding. And I keep telling the rest of the artists working on this, this is an opportunity that doesn't come around very often, to work on something this uniq
However, it’s yet another aspect that emphasizes just how hard like is on Arrakis. This definitely encourages players to be as resourceful as they can, and makes it clear that even though the game contains PvP elements and other enemies, survival is perhaps the biggest core pillar of the game above combat or crafting. It’s difficult to say how my time with the game compares to the full in-game experience involving other players, but it’s clear that **Dune: Awakening ** has done an excellent job of capturing the core feeling of Arrakis and the many dangers that come with