Dune: The Battle for Arrakis

The desert of the planet Arrakis, a war over the most precious resource in the universe, and real-time strategy transferred to a console gamepad – Dune: The Battle for Arrakis is remarkable proof that the RTS genre could take root beyond the world of computers. This console version of a classic ranks among the very best the Mega Drive offered in the strategy genre.

The game is the console incarnation of Dune II by Westwood Studios, generally regarded as a seminal work that shaped the modern form of real-time strategy. In story and theme it draws on Frank Herbert's legendary Dune universe: on Arrakis, three great houses vie for dominance over the mining of the spice melange, the resource on which the entire empire depends.

The gameplay loop defined a formula that hundreds of strategy games have copied ever since: you build a base, harvest resources, construct production buildings, train units and send them into battle against the enemy. Economic management, territorial expansion and tactical deployment of your army intertwine into a tense match in which both strategic planning and the ability to react to your opponent's moves in real time are decisive.

What's extraordinary is the very fact that such a complex RTS was successfully brought to a gamepad. Controls that a mouse handled on PC had to be completely reworked for the console – and the result was so successful that it became a benchmark for how strategy can be played even without a keyboard. For many Mega Drive players it was their very first contact with a genre that would later conquer the gaming world.

The combination of the strong Dune brand, the pioneering gameplay of Dune II and a quality console conversion makes this a historically significant title. It's both a gateway to the genre and a reminder of the era when real-time strategy was only just establishing itself as one of the pillars of the gaming industry.

For strategy fans and lovers of the Dune universe alike, this version is the ideal way to experience the birth of a genre right on a 16-bit console.

Why play: For one of the games that defined real-time strategy, in a well-executed console conversion set in the legendary world of Dune.