SPICE JAM

Craft and fight for your life on Arrakis in Funcom's survival MMO DUNE: AWAKENING

- Christopher Livingston

I'm collecting the most valuable substance in the universe, spice, when a sandworm explodes out of the dunes a few meters in front of me. I knew it was coming—it always does—but I didn't expect it to pop up so close to me. I yell a bad word and leap into the cockpit of my ornithopter as my entire screen fills with a gaping mouth the size of a subway tunnel.

I know I'm just sitting at my desk holding down my space bar, but in my head I'm pulling up on the control stick of my ornithopter with all my strength as bad words continue to pour out of me. If this worm swallows me I'll lose everything: my thopter, the spice in my pockets, everything else in my pockets, and even the pockets themselves. I'll respawn in just my undies and have to re-craft my armor, weapons, tools and vehicle. Fear is the mind-killer, but a sandworm is the gear-killer.

ENOUGH ALTITUDE

I gain just enough altitude to escape, but I legitimately have to take a few moments for my heart to stop pounding before I can set back down on the sand to continue my spice collecting. The prospect of losing everything to a sandworm is just one reason why even 100 hours in, Dune: Awakening is still a thrill.

Funcom's survival MMO is a lot of things: a compelling PvE sandbox you can play alone, a coop survival game you can conquer with friends, and a cutthroat PvP extraction game that doesn't even enter the mix until you've played for about 80 hours. Some of this Funcom pulls off successfully, some is a bit rough, but the parts of Dune: Awakening that work are great enough to justify enduring the stuff that doesn't.

The opening hours of