Dune Awakening Review
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Today, we're diving into the sands of Arrakis to review Dune: Awakening, a few weeks after its launch. And I'm going to explain why this is an awesome game... that I can't recommend at the moment.


The game is always online, which... isn't my favorite thing. I'd really love for this to get a single-player option, like Conan Exiles.

And that brings me to the biggest issue Dune: Awakening faced at launch: the private servers. I bought the Ultimate Edition to play early on the 5th, but playing on private servers was impossible. I wanted to play solo, and I got a private server to do so. The private servers had issues that extended past launch day. I was able to play on the 11th without any problems, but then a new problem came up that made the game unplayable for another two days!

Other than that, I'm still experiencing insane frame drops. I'm talking, even with a 4090, it's so bad that the game freezes for two seconds, mostly in PvP areas, outposts, and caves. And no, my PC isn't the problem. It's the game. It's unacceptable and needs to be addressed ASAP. Oh, and before I forget, FPS drops also occur while driving or flying around too fast. My SSD is pretty good; Assassin's Creed Shadows boots up in a second, so... what?



The actual game is really good and bad. It's grindy as ♥♥♥♥ as a solo player, but that can be addressed in the future, which it better is. Like the devs making a big portion of the Deep Desert a PvE area, which is great! Meaning you don't have forced PvP in the endgame anymore. Which seems nice at first but having a random rock structures suddenly be flagged as pvp isn't really making it better, it's not really obvious what's pvp besides the big ships of course. There needs to be some indicator on the map like a red circle around those.

The game has a story, and it's a mixed bag. The Fremen questline is a bit like Fallout 76's holotape quests, but it works here because it's not just that. I don't want to spoil anything because the story has some really cool moments that need to be experienced firsthand! But that brings me to the 2nd part of the Story. And that's where things get really interesting, the Game kind of transforms itself into an Assassins Creed Game with a lot of cool missions that I thought to be amazing. When you reach the End of the 2nd Act however... the Story just ends. No conclusion no nothing! What the Hell?! are you serious? Is the 3rd Act going to be one of the paid Story Dlc's? it better not be paid. I warn you. We know the Game isn't done and it shows. So don't you dare.



What about the gunplay and combat? Well, the AI is pretty stupid, just running straight at you, which you can take advantage of by confusing them. I went into a high-gear, high-level dungeon with my first upgraded gear, from Copper to Iron, and I cleared it. I got the Native Stillsuit transmog, which means the AI is really stupid. I should have died in there. A few improvements, like flanking and not just walking toward you or sometimes past you, would be appreciated, but it's still a lot of fun. The weapons are easy to handle, and everything has a feeling of impact. Even melee is great, but that brings me back to the AI... I just wait for them to hit me so I can parry them. Make of that what you will. The enemies in the Deep Desert provide more of a challenge though, even if it's in a way that I despise. same AI just a giant health bar and a high damage output that's it.

Now, the game also has mining, which works with a laser, and I just love the sounds of it. Extremely satisfying. But there's not much else to say about that. It's just mining. Harvesting water from plants or taking the blood from your enemies to transform it into water. Getting Spice is the Endgame by the way which is fine and terrible at the same time but the system itself is good.



The PvE-focused map is huge! With so many different things to discover, it's just insane. That a sand map is interesting to walk and play in just shows you how talented the devs are. Really good job on that. But that worm... that is terrifying. I saw it flying once... that was something. oh well.

Which brings me to that ♥♥♥♥♥, the Sandworm. It's scary and very dangerous. If you die to either the Worm or a Sandstorm, you lose everything you have: armor, weapons, everything you carry. I haven't died to that yet, and if I did, I'd probably stop playing, which might be an issue, but only the actual data can tell if it is or not.

Now, the game has a character creator, which is pretty good, crisp and responsive sound design, and what not. The game's graphics are good, and really good for an MMO. The game actually looks like the footage from the trailer's isn't that right Crimson Desert?



Dune also has a kind of class system where you can be like me and use the grappling hook so much that you don't want to stop using it. The Classes vary but you aren't locked to a specific one. You can unlock all of them and use them. You can mix and match all abilities for your slots from every class if you have it. And just as a tip, don't pick trooper as your starting class, you can unlock that one in the starting area.

Now there is one more thing I want to talk about, The Endgame... it sucks. One of the worst Endgames I've ever seen. Getting the highest tier of gear as a Solo player is so expensive in resources and not only that, trying to get these resources for crafting is a pain. There is like one note every five minutes which give you like nothing and you need two different once to craft the highest ingot. once you have that you need to farm spice which takes a while as a Solo player. And with a while I mean... trying to get all of the highest tier of crafting stations takes 33.5 hours of nonstop crafting, and that's only the spice I just mentioned. And no it doesn't include any weapons or armor pieces. just the crafting stations. I refuse to do that. No I'm not subjecting myself to 200 hours of torture. No thanks.

But why am I not recommending it right now? It's very simple: the game's technical state is terrible. Frames are all over the place, and sometimes... it's unplayable, the Endgame sucks and the Story just stops it's just not ready for the masses. And I'd say that it feels like an Early Access. So give it a while. The story and technical state might look different in six months, but until then, hold off for now.

I will Update this review when things improve and change. Thank you for reading.

Dune Awakening Review ---------------------- Today, we're diving into the sands of Arrakis to review Dune: Awakening, a few weeks after its launch. And I'm going to explain why this is an awesome game... that I can't recommend at the moment. The game is always online, which... isn't my favorite thing. I'd really love for this to get a single-player option, like Conan Exiles. And that brings me to the biggest issue Dune: Awakening faced at launch: the private servers. I bought the Ultimate Edition to play early on the 5th, but playing on private servers was impossible. I wanted to play solo, and I got a private server to do so. The private servers had issues that extended past launch day. I was able to play on the 11th without any problems, but then a new problem came up that made the game unplayable for another two days! Other than that, I'm still experiencing insane frame drops. I'm talking, even with a 4090, it's so bad that the game freezes for two seconds, mostly in PvP areas, outposts, and caves. And no, my PC isn't the problem. It's the game. It's unacceptable and needs to be addressed ASAP. Oh, and before I forget, FPS drops also occur while driving or flying around too fast. My SSD is pretty good; Assassin's Creed Shadows boots up in a second, so... what? The actual game is really good and bad. It's grindy as fuck as a solo player, but that can be addressed in the future, which it better is. Like the devs making a big portion of the Deep Desert a PvE area, which is great! Meaning you don't have forced PvP in the endgame anymore. Which seems nice at first but having a random rock structures suddenly be flagged as pvp isn't really making it better, it's not really obvious what's pvp besides the big ships of course. There needs to be some indicator on the map like a red circle around those. The game has a story, and it's a mixed bag. The Fremen questline is a bit like Fallout 76's holotape quests, but it works here because it's not just that. I don't want to spoil anything because the story has some really cool moments that need to be experienced firsthand! But that brings me to the 2nd part of the Story. And that's where things get really interesting, the Game kind of transforms itself into an Assassins Creed Game with a lot of cool missions that I thought to be amazing. When you reach the End of the 2nd Act however... the Story just ends. No conclusion no nothing! What the Hell?! are you serious? Is the 3rd Act going to be one of the paid Story Dlc's? it better not be paid. I warn you. We know the Game isn't done and it shows. So don't you dare. What about the gunplay and combat? Well, the AI is pretty stupid, just running straight at you, which you can take advantage of by confusing them. I went into a high-gear, high-level dungeon with my first upgraded gear, from Copper to Iron, and I cleared it. I got the Native Stillsuit transmog, which means the AI is really stupid. I should have died in there. A few improvements, like flanking and not just walking toward you or sometimes past you, would be appreciated, but it's still a lot of fun. The weapons are easy to handle, and everything has a feeling of impact. Even melee is great, but that brings me back to the AI... I just wait for them to hit me so I can parry them. Make of that what you will. The enemies in the Deep Desert provide more of a challenge though, even if it's in a way that I despise. same AI just a giant health bar and a high damage output that's it. Now, the game also has mining, which works with a laser, and I just love the sounds of it. Extremely satisfying. But there's not much else to say about that. It's just mining. Harvesting water from plants or taking the blood from your enemies to transform it into water. Getting Spice is the Endgame by the way which is fine and terrible at the same time but the system itself is good. The PvE-focused map is huge! With so many different things to discover, it's just insane. That a sand map is interesting to walk and play in just shows you how talented the devs are. Really good job on that. But that worm... that is terrifying. I saw it flying once... that was something. oh well. Which brings me to that bitch, the Sandworm. It's scary and very dangerous. If you die to either the Worm or a Sandstorm, you lose everything you have: armor, weapons, everything you carry. I haven't died to that yet, and if I did, I'd probably stop playing, which might be an issue, but only the actual data can tell if it is or not. Now, the game has a character creator, which is pretty good, crisp and responsive sound design, and what not. The game's graphics are good, and really good for an MMO. The game actually looks like the footage from the trailer's isn't that right Crimson Desert? Dune also has a kind of class system where you can be like me and use the grappling hook so much that you don't want to stop using it. The Classes vary but you aren't locked to a specific one. You can unlock all of them and use them. You can mix and match all abilities for your slots from every class if you have it. And just as a tip, don't pick trooper as your starting class, you can unlock that one in the starting area. Now there is one more thing I want to talk about, The Endgame... it sucks. One of the worst Endgames I've ever seen. Getting the highest tier of gear as a Solo player is so expensive in resources and not only that, trying to get these resources for crafting is a pain. There is like one note every five minutes which give you like nothing and you need two different once to craft the highest ingot. once you have that you need to farm spice which takes a while as a Solo player. And with a while I mean... trying to get all of the highest tier of crafting stations takes 33.5 hours of nonstop crafting, and that's only the spice I just mentioned. And no it doesn't include any weapons or armor pieces. just the crafting stations. I refuse to do that. No I'm not subjecting myself to 200 hours of torture. No thanks. But why am I not recommending it right now? It's very simple: the game's technical state is terrible. Frames are all over the place, and sometimes... it's unplayable, the Endgame sucks and the Story just stops it's just not ready for the masses. And I'd say that it feels like an Early Access. So give it a while. The story and technical state might look different in six months, but until then, hold off for now. I will Update this review when things improve and change. Thank you for reading.