Awakening is the Perfect Starter Game For Survival Noobs

One of the biggest issues facing studios when crafting their games is that they need to ensure it not only abides by the hallmarks of the genre it is exploring, but that it is also very open to those that may have never played a game within that genre before. With Dune: Awakening, Funcom has crafted another exciting survival game that will likely test even the most veteran of players. But, at the same time, Dune: Awakening feels extremely open and inviting to those unfamiliar with survival games. And that has made for a pretty exciting adventure.

When players first start their Dune: Awakening adventure, they quickly learn that Arrakis is not for the faint of heart. The sun will kill them, sandworms lurk around every corner, and the land is filled with NPCs who simply want to take them down. Couple that with all the classic hallmarks of a survival game, and it makes for a pretty nerve-racking experience. However, there are plenty of mechanics and features that also help make things so much more approachable, which really helps make this game the perfect starter survival game.

Dune Awakening Opening Hour Greatest Hits Compilation

Dune: Awakening’s Opening Hour Feels Like a Greatest Hits Compilation

Dune: Awakening does not waste anytime getting players into the action, and through those opening hours, it feels like a fantastic time for Dune fans.

Dune: Awakening Feels Extremely Approachable for New Survival Fans

The Early Hours of Dune: Awakening Are Not Very Daunting

One of the biggest reasons that Dune: Awakening feels like the perfect starter survival game is that those first couple of hours are extremely inviting. From the second the game kicks off, players are not alone. For starters, they can team up with their friends and traverse the dunes of Arrakis alongside them. But they are also constantly accompanied by the game’s Journey system, which essentially serves as a story-based tutorial. Through this, they are walked through practically every single one of the game’s mechanics, with it gradually increasing in difficulty as players push further through.

On top of that, if players are careful, it does not really take much work to get back to where they were after they died. Just like with most survival games, they tend to lose items upon death, especially if they are killed by a sandworm. While having to recover said items is never fun, rebuilding what was lost in those early hours feels pretty easy. The resources are not hard to track down, there is not much that goes into those early items, and traversing that starter area is pretty easy. That may not be the case once players enter the higher-level areas, but by then they should be survival game masters.

Dune: Awakening Has So Many Features Helping Players Out

If that was not enough, Dune: Awakening has a few other features that will surely help players out. For one, the game actually marks on the map where all the enemy camps and resources are. So, instead of forcing players to spend hours tracking down what they need, they simply have to open the map and find the icon that matches what they are looking for. This really helps make the scrounging of resources feel like a breeze, which lets players focus far more on Dune: Awakening‘s action.

Along with that, there is no food or sleep mechanic, so players do not have to spend time focusing on that. Instead, there is a water mechanic, but filling that up is pretty easy. Couple that with everything else, and Dune: Awakening’s survival mechanics do not really feel as daunting as they could be. Of course, Arrakis is not easy to survive, yet Funcom has definitely helped make it more inviting than other survival games on the market.

It remains to be seen just where Funcom takes Dune: Awakening next. As of now, it really does feel like one of the best starter survival games out there. And once players are able to master its many mechanics, there is an entire genre of exciting games just waiting for them to explore.