Customer Reviews

Frank Herbert's Dune

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(11)

 

 

Firstly can I say that I played this game on PS2 for some reason they don't have that version of it here on Amazon.com. Still regardless of the format this game is so astoundingly bad that it still deserves a savaging. Even on a Playstation Controller the controls for this game are still awkward and clumsy. You chop and change camera with a confusing speed, which is especially annoying, when you attempting to sneak up on some one shoot them from a distance. Paul also has an annoying habit of getting stuck to walls when he is being shot. Normally you can walk up to a wall and put your back to it to sneak past guards and staff but you need to actually pull yourself away from a wall in order to respond to a guards attack.

The gameplay is also the complete pants. It skips or fast forwards through large chunks of the Dune story and used so much of the jargon of the books without clear explanation that you would have to be a serious devotee of the books to follow the plot. Hell this is even worse than David Lynch's Dune movie! Important details like the codes you need to open locked doors are hidden in the smallest most hard to see places that you waste literally hours looking for them. Also for a 3rd person shooter / RPG the lack of ammo is an absolute joke. For example in the second level there are seven guards to kill, each guard takes 3 shots to kill provided you are a good shot and you only have 15 bullets!

You are a complete sucker if you buy this game. Trade it now before it ruins your life. If you are even contemplating renting it don't. Read the book (again) or hire the David Lynch movie of the TV mini series.

OK, this must be by far the winner in two catagories: 1. The worst adaptation of a novel into the PC gaming format; and 2. The worst 3D PC game ever produced. Since I can not rate it at NO stars, I am forced to give it a 1 star which is much, much more than it deserves. What were you guys at Dreamcatcher thinking? Do you have any quality control staff, or is the pursuit of the almighty buck so overwhelming, and by any means necessary, that this tripe is maketed and sold to an unsuspecting public! Please recal this game and destroy all copies at once! I could not wait to uninstall and relegate to the dustbin. The game fails misearbly on all levels; story, gameplay, controls, enjoyability and fun, you name it, and is a genuine waste of cash. Please, I am a mature gamer and have played over 100 titles in my time. Some better than others, some worse, but this game by far is the greatest disapointment in any gaming experience I have ever had. Save your money; this is not, repeat not, even worth considering.

Wow. When I saw the cover for this game, I thought to myself "Finally! Somebody has made a 3D Dune game!" Then I put the game in my computer and nearly broke down crying because it was SOOOOOO bad. I mean, this game is beyond bad. First: the story is confusing, and, as a fan of the Dune series, disgustingly wrong. Names are confused, people are referred to by the wrong titles, and it's just sad. It makes me wonder if anyone at Dreamcatcher has actually READ the book. Second: the controls are confusing at best, difficult at worst. You can't change them, so you better get used to it. The camera is dizzying and hard to follow. I uninstalled the game in the middle of the second level, because I got tired of restarting my computer every time Paul got caught behind a wall or in a wall and the controls froze. So, ultimately, if you like Dune, do not buy this game. However, if you like video games, do not buy this game.

This game was one of the biggest dissappointments I've ever had in a game. Dreamcatcher has made some great games, but maybe action games just aren't their forte. This game has terrible controls, you have to use the directional keys for movement and can't use w,a,s,d, so if you are right handed, like most people, it is realy awkward. Every action like opening doors or changing weapons is terrible. If an enemy actually sees you there really isn't much you can do but stand there while they shoot you to death. The voice work was ok, and the look of the game wasn't that bad, but all the other mistakes far outweigh any positives. I have a decent graphics card and it still took me quite a while just to get the game to work. A sad release of what should have been such a great game. I know it looks like fun but really don't bother with this one.

Story adaption is awful, gameplay is terrible, and user interface is very frustrating, to put it mildly. It appears they didnt do a lot of testing before releasing this opus barfo to the public.

Horrible only begins to describe this game. Putrid tripe put out to make a buck. Could they make the controls more confusing. If I were an octopus, maybe I would have arms enough to control the keyboard, mouse, and (I swear) telepathic controls. Did I mention that the game is horrible.

When will the gaming world understand that if a book cannot be made into a movie, then it has no business trying to turn a mini-series that tried to unsuccessfuly capture the essence of Dune into a video game.

You begin the game listening to a short prologue that seems to borrow from the David Lynch version of Dune. Then you are thrust into a scene where Paul and his mother are running from the sand worm. This would be fun and an interesting progression only for the fact that the angle that you are forced to view the level is in front of Paul. He is looking at you, actually. There is a huge sand worm coming from behind you and the task that you have to perform is running on patches of sand that will not cause you to sink down. The problem is you cannot see in front of you. You have to constantly guess where the safe sand is. It is nothing but trial and error, and you will be eaten by the sand worm several times.

That is the first level. It only gets worse from there. The graphics are par at best, nothing compared to the excellent graphics that are displayed in the recent Return to Castle Wolfenstein, and the upcoming Unreal 2. The AI needs some tweaking: the guards will shoot you to death and then ask "who's there." Also there are bugs in the game. Enemies will walk through walls. They can shoot you from behind a wall, but you cannot seem to hit them.

Worst of all, though, is the camera angle. It is so awkward, that it takes away from the game play. If you put the camera on automatic, then the angle changes so rapidly as to give you vertigo and lose all sense of direction. It you decide to take over the camera with your mouse, then it becoms a struggle for the best angle. The game is bent around stealth and the point of view prevents this. THe game creators should have studied Thief the Dark Project a little more.

This game might sell well because of all of the fans of the Dune series. However, I hope that it fails miserable. Only then will we have a gaming company that will seriously look at the series and provide us a avenue that is worthy of the Dune title.

1 star is 1 too many for this disgrace. I bought it hoping for a glimmer of the brilliance in Herbert's novels, but no such luck. Not only did the graphics, storyline, controls, and gameplay fall flat on their face, the game also froze before I ever made it out of the first level. Do not buy this game.

The graphic is awful, every character you talk to sonds like to have a rod right up in the @$$, ther's no savegame but when you are in the sietch (the Fremen base), the movement keys are the arrows of the keyboard AND you must use the mouse, a right-handed has a little difficult doing so... there's no difficult setting, it's fixed on impossible, enemies go down with 3-4 shots of the gun, but in the whole level there aren't spare shots fo HALF OF THEM, the targeting system doesn't think corners or boulders can stop your bullets to reach the target, so you'll waste lots of them for nothing, the kriss is utterly useless, you can use it only for sneak attacks to get the water for the enemies, in a direct attack Paul will do amazing, random moves that don't graze a sheet of paper, much less a Harkonnen soldier, if you are walking with the back on a wall and someone finds you, tou'll be shot down before you can get away from the wall, the camera changings will make you crush on a wall or stumble on an enemy you didn't see till the last moment. Don't buy this game, it's a waste of money and an insult to both Herbert's masterpiece and your intelligence.

The characters don't look like any of the people you have seen in the mini series or the original film but the gameplay is easy to learn but very dependant on patience and awareness. Most of all stealth is required, much like in the Metal Gear Solid games you have to suprise your enemies and if you can't then shoot them at range.

If your a dune fan give it a try but if you don't like to work in your games don't, this takes patience and control. Experience gamers only!

rated 4 instead of 5 cause the character work is poorly done