There’s been a lot of doubt cast on story since Eurogamer publisheไd an interview with Joel Bylos, developer Funcom’s chief creative officer and creative director.
In the interview, Byblos explains that Dune: Awakening has an alternate history approach to 🐈Frank Herbert’s books. Instead of adhering to the events in the novels, the game depicts a universe where different decisions were made, leading𝔍 to a different timeline in the same universe. The game also takes place before those events.
More importantly, one of those different decisions has allowed Bylos to, , “sort of si🥃destep religion”. Obviously, this set fans of the series on edge – how can you tell Dune’s story without bringing religion into it? Religion is one of the core themes. It seemed from the interview that he was referring to one specific part of Dune’s plot and that religion was still a big part of the game, and it was a change made to preserve the books’ lore, but his phrasing was worrying, to say the least.
The March 6 Clarification
Later, in , the team clarified that they “agree that religion is an integral part of the Dune universe” and that you will meet and interact with people of di🌸fferent religions in-game. However, “the player is not a messiah” and won’t be affecting those religions. In a follow-up statement to IGN, Bylos said that because your character is not the alleg🔥ed Kwisatz Haderach, the game won’t approach religion in the same way.
This helps to alleviate some concerns about how the game tackles, or doesn’t tackle, religion. If the gaไme didn’t have the books’ religions at all, it wouldn’t really be a Dune game – it would be more of a survival game with a Dune skin. We now know that those religions are depicted in the game, possibly with similar tensions and goals, but we don’t know to what extent th⭕at drives the narrative.
If It Isn’t The Same Story, Will It Make The Same Point?
We also know that this means the ꦅgame will not have the sam𒀰e message as the books. Dune was written to subvert the common trope of there being a ‘chosen one’ who can save the world. It decries the existence of a messiah, and tackles the idea of the ‘white saviour’.
Inherently, the book is challenging reader expectations about what makes a hero or a leader and how religions are exploited by bad actors for their own means, and it does this by explicitly drawing from real-world religions. It’s clear the game isn’t about that at all, so what is it about? 💃If it doesn’t have the same message as the books, what message does it have? Is there a mess𒀰age at all, or is it just about surviving the brutal desert planet of Arrakis?
This doesn’t spell doom for the game by any means – we just don’t know that much about it right 🔥now. The changes to the game’s premise were signed off on by the Herbert estate, so it probably isn’t as bad as doomsayers might think. But this follow-up statement doesn’t change the perception that the core theme of the books doesn’t have a presence in Dune: Awakening, and we don’t know if that means the heavy religious overtones a𝔉re just going to be set dressing and worldbuilding.
It’s fine that the game doesn’t have the🦄 same story as the books – it was never going to, it’s a survival game. But I’m hoping that the series’ complex and still-relevant themes won’t be ignored in pursuit of an easier, more palatable narrative designed to be conducive to live-service trappings. That would be the worst possible outcome.
Dune: Part Two꧙ Is An Old-Fashioned Kind Of Team-Up Movie
Unlike The Avengers, Dune: Pa🌱rt Two is exciti♎ng because it brings huge actors together, not iconic characters.
