We have already reported on the hidden radio stations you may take heed to as you traipse about reducing up rocks in survival MMO Dune: Awakening. They play chiptuney classics from the unique, 1992 Dune video games that can drive you barely mad even with out huffing spice. However additionally they embrace full-blown radios drama primarily based on numerous backstory occasions which unfolded earlier than you arrived on-planet. It’s like listening to a extremely intense episode of The Archers on BBC Radio Arrakis.
The radio channels are a bit tucked away – you would be forgiven for by no means even noticing them. You’ll find ’em by hitting the social tab within the sport’s menu. There you see one other tab referred to as the “Communinet”, the place you may faucet slightly broadcast image button to tune into one in all 4 stations, every run by totally different factions inside the Dune universe.
The Harvester’s channel features a sitcom recorded “in entrance of a reside studio viewers” a few working household, with a dad who’s received some actual Del Boy vitality, cockney accent included. And the Home Atreides channel options an action-heavy warfare drama that tells the courageous story of Home guardians who work collectively and battle Harkonnen dirtbags to realize an ideal and honourable army victory. “Keep in mind! Honour and loyalty are the true marks of a great warrior!” says the announcer when that dramatisation ends. Typical do-gooder propaganda. Here is a sample of another drama that performs on one station.
The Harkonnen Community in the meantime, do their very own factor. They broadcast propagandistic monologues, or reside slave fights as described by Russian-accented commentators. One battle I listened to noticed a pair of offended twins hop into the sector and minimize down the would-be victor. “Silly competitors, that was rigged!” grumps one of many announcers when he sees the assault. The opposite announcer awkwardly bumbles on together with her commentary, nervously laughing, as if to say: “Shut up, you are going to get us executed.”
It is an incongruous function for lore-likers and laugh-seekers. Each an in depth world-building train, and a comically un-Dune tackle the long-running fictional world. Lazlo’s radio chat reveals in GTA video games exist inside a larger world of satire (nevertheless you are feeling concerning the efficacy of that satire). However Dune is just not, by intention at the very least, a “humorous” universe. You scurry round within the sand, chatting to NPCs who drop limitless serious-faced phrases of lore concerning the emperor and your home in a inflexible society. You then go for a sandbike trip and take heed to radio announcers bellowing “YOU’RE LISTENING TO THE HARKONNEN NETWORK! STAY TUNED!” It’s deeply humorous.
My upcoming overview of Dune: Awakening remains to be within the works. My preliminary impressions are: it isn’t unhealthy. Survival video games are dependant on a way of stability in a approach many different genres can typically keep away from. How briskly your numerous meters deplete, and the way a lot scrounging you need to do – these are sometimes essential to get proper. And from what I’ve performed thus far, it looks like Funcom have managed to maintain these inside tolerable limits at the very least. Every part else within the sport? Effectively, STAY TUNED TO RADIO RPS TO FIND OUT.
