Funcom and Shiro Games have announced they will be releasing Dune: Spice Wars on Steam Early Access on 26th April. Based on Frank Herbert’s sci-fi epic, Dune: Spice Wars will pit four factions against one another on real-time strategic battles on the desert planet of Arrakis.
As well as the good news for the early access release date, Funcom has also revealed the fourth playable faction, the Fremen. Led by the prominent planetologist Liet Kynes, the Fremen have many advantages in the hostile desert, including the ability to travel further before suffering exhaustion, less chance of attracting the colossal sandworms and even use the sandworms to travel and strike at the heart of enemy settlements. Fremen also have the improved ability to ally with the neutral native settlements, known as Sietches, and expand their area of influence.
The Fremen’s main fighting units will go into battle on foot (unless they can encourage a sandworm) with the main units being the Warriors. Armed with long knives the warriors are experts at using the hostile desert terrain. Infiltrators will be invisible to the enemy until it’s time to strike while Skirmishes go in to ambushes loud and proud with their large supply of grenades. The Freman elites are the Fedaykins and are trained in the weirding way and armed with crysknives. Finally, the Kulon Caravans can be used to set up Hiereg camps that can heal and resupply all Fremen units.
“With so many massive Dune fans in the studio, the excitement I see every day of working with this universe is very real, and we hope this comes across in the game,” says Sebastien Vidal, CEO of Shiro Games. “With all this passion for the source material, and all the know-how we’ve gathered from making Northgard, we can’t wait to put this game into players’ hands.”
Look out for Dune: Spice Wars releasing on Early Access on Steam on 26th April.
