During the Game Developers Conference 2024 in San Francisco, Funcom provided the first detailed Dune Awakening presentation to the press. For the full details of what was discussed in the open world survival MMO's overview, head to our previous article.
Here, we'll focus on the subsequent roundtable Q&A with Dune Awakening Creative Director Joel Bylos. A 17-year veteran of the Norwegian studio who is credited for working on games like Age of Conan, The Secret World, The Park, Conan Exiles, Conan: Unconquered, and even Metal: Hellsinger, Bylos was all too happy to indulge the many questions posed to him about the upcoming Unreal Engine 5 powered game (currently in beta testing).
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Do you have to be a female character to play a Bene Gesserit?
No. The idea is that you aren't becoming a member of the Bene Gesserit, you've just been trained by people who know how to train in the ways of the Bene Gesserit. There's a couple of examples of this in the books and of course, in the movie as well, when Paul is obviously trained by his mother. We have these examples of men picking up some of the traits as well, as long as they don't become official Bene Gesserit. That's how we are playing it in the game as well.
WCCFTECH: There's the idea among some gamers that Dune: Awakening will just be a regular survival game rather than a survival MMO. You claimed the latter from the beginning, and the Steam page even mentioned thousands of players at the same time, but that's since been removed. Can you clarify how the servers work and how many players will be online on a server at any one time?
Sure. It's different maps. The reason we removed thousands of players at one time was that our optimization was not saying 1000 at the same time. So we were like, ok, that's misleading. It's hundreds at the very least, and right now I would say so.
I have written a blog for marketing to put out, which actually explains it with diagrams, but I'll try and give you a very quick technical overview. We have multiple maps in the game: a survival map, a deep desert map, and social hubs. These are all separate maps running their own Unreal server, and they all have different amounts of players per server. A social map might have 200 players. The deep desert map might have 500 players. The survival map might have 50 to 100 players, depending on how optimized it is and how many buildings there are.
We have multiple of each of those maps on the same world, in the same way that lots of MMOs instance out once an area is full. But the difference between us and a normal survival game is that most survival games have a single map, and
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Arrowhead Game Studios CEO Johann Pilestedt has revealed that Helldivers 2 will not be getting a transmog system. Pilestedt, who also works as creative director on Helldivers 2, took to social media platform X (formerly Twitter) to talk about why a transmog system doesn’t make sense for the game.
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The Elder Scrolls Online is celebrating its tenth anniversary over the next year, and the game has changed a lot in that decade. One Tamriel opened up every zone to every level, making it so that you could travel the world at your leisure without ever feeling underpowered, and countless expansions have launched that introduced entirely new modes and mechanics, shifting up the meta, combat, and ways in which you can conquer the endgame.
Square Enix has released a free demo for SaGa Emerald Beyond, the next mainline title in the unorthodox role-playing game series. It’s available for PS4, PS5, PC and Nintendo Switch, allowing players to control Tsunanori Mido, one of six playable characters. Check out the release trailer below.
Square Enix has released new information and screenshots for SaGa Emerald Beyond introducing Diva No. 5, a songstress mech who has lost her singing voice and body, and one of the game’s six protagonists.
Square Enix has released trailers for five members of SaGa Emerald Beyond’s unorthodox cast, and now, the final one is available. Check out Diva No. 5, a former songstress mech who’s abandoned her original frame to cross between worlds.
Square Enix has released two news trailer for SaGa Emerald Beyond. The first introduces Diva No. 5, one of the game’s six protagonists, while the second acts as the game’s “Final” trailer.
Yellow Brick Games, the studio co-founded by Dragon Age creative director Mike Laidlaw, has finally announced its first project. Titled Eternal Strands, it looks like an incredible blend of Shadow of the Colossus with modern Zelda, and it's instantly shot to the top of my gaming wishlist.
With Square Enix’s Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth out now on PS5 and earning extensive accolades from critics, the development team is focusing on the third and final entry of the Remake saga. Though it hasn’t announced a release window or even an official name, a new 42-minute video is available where Rebirth composer Nobuo Uematsu, scenario writer Kazushige Nojima and creative director Tetsuya Nomura talk about the trilogy.