Emperor: Battle for Dune

"Great game of it's genre, but quite repetitive..."

Once again the great Houses of the Landsraad battle for ownership of Dune. Quite why they don't just nuke each other in orbit is anybody's guess (yeah yeah, Great Convention I know).
But why complain? Without their petty little squabblings we wouldn't have this game now, would we?

Emperor is the latest Real Time Strategy game from those wacky guys at Westwood who brought us the much loved (or hated ^_^) Command & Conquer series and of course started it all with the original Dune II (yes I am stating the obvious. No I will not apologize for it).
Anyway, on with the review!

Gameplay (8/10): If you're a C&C player you're right at home here, many things are more or less the same as ever.
Pick one of three Houses to fight for, the Atreides, Ordos or Harkonnen each with their own units and abilities.
You can also use 'SubHouse' units in the game which don't belong to any specific House which include the Sardaukar Terrortroops and the ever resourceful Fremen.
You have your building options on the right side, map at the top right and the battlefield everywhere else.
The basic gameplay formula is the same as every RTS since time imemorial: Mine for resources, (Spice in this case) build your base, churn out units and crush the enemy!
Don't be fooled by the snazzy 3D graphics as the movement of units and the placement of structures are also similar, though the nature of Dune makes for some differences, you must build your base on hard rock and your harvesters must venture out into the desert where the Spice and the sandworms are. Sandworms are back and nastier than ever, coming in huge chase you style or mega huge swallow you style, both of which can eat up you're forces if you're not careful!

The way that the missions are given to you is a bit different. Instead of going through a set number of missions in a linear fashion (though there are many setpiece missions) you are presented with a map of Dune with the territories of the three houses marked on it. You must decide which territory to start a mission in from the ones selectable. Succesfully completing the mission gains you that territory, and you keep going until you capture enough territory to be able to attack the enemy capital.
That may sound complicated and involved, but it isn't, the strategic map is mostly cosmetic and the amount of territory you capture does not affect the game in any serious way (in fact, it's possible to capture about 3 or 4 territories and be able to attack the capital thus making the game rather short).

The missions themselves are quite varied as they attempt to have you do something other than just building your base and destroying the enemy, such as capturing a spy or protecting a village.
The voice of your Mentat and a green window showing events of importance pop up regularly to advise you on your mission, but both tend to end up annoying you as they clutter up the screen and make you lose your concentration big time.

Special mention has to go to the astoundingly dumb AI of the Spice Harvesters. Many RTS games seem to suffer from a general lack of intelligence in their resource gathering vehicles, but these take the cake. Watch as they waltz into enemy territory and get blown up! Cry as they attempt to OUTRUN Sandworms when that Carryall could've lifted them to safety. You always have to keep an eye on these morons or your cashflow will drop. Dramatically.

Graphics (7/10): Nice looking and solid. The vehicles look nice, move over the sand convincingly and blow up well, which is always nice :)
However, a lot of stuff can seem generic, especially buildings and infantry which are hard to tell apart from a distance.
Most of the maps are of Dune and as such present the same view of brown rock and yellow/orange sand along with the occasional village and tree. It looks very nice but can be samy, which is probably why some other enviroments such as the greenery of Caladan or the corridors of the Heighliner were thrown in.

The movies. Well, in general they are well done and look like they came straight out of the Dune movie, many of the uniforms, settings, spaceships, etc. are exactly the same (check out Sting wannabe Gunseng).
Familiar faces such as Michael ''Worf'' Dorn as Duke Achillus Atreides are a nice touch (actually he's the only familiar face to me apart from that Harkonnen Mentat guy) and the acting's okay, good at times but some hammy performances at others, more or less what you'd expect from movies in this sort of game. Funnily enough, you might find yourself longing for the next movie as in the middle of the game there are few of them if any!

Sound (8/10): Usual fare. Explosions, weapons fire, machinery, friendly computer voice and nagging Mentat.
All of it sounds as it should, though the voice samples of the units can get extremly repetitive (I defy you to not grimace in annoyance the 500th time an Atriedes soldier yells ''For the Duke!'').

The music is great. Each House gets their own set of music tracks which reflect a bit about who they are.
The Atriedes get long movie style music scores mixed in with some remixes of Dune II music, the Harkonnen get harsh guitar music for the most part, while the Ordos have more 'mechanical' tunes.

Difficulty (3/10): Nothing really that difficult. The enemy AI seems a bit trickier than usual and seems to favor tank rushing you (and it absolutely LOVES blowing up your harvesters) but isn't really anything to worry about. You can complete it in a few hours on easy setting if you're familiar with it all.

Replayability (6/10): There are three Houses to go through, though you might get bored by the third house.
The missions while scripted and seemingly varied do become samy after a while because it still boils down to the same defeat the enemy totally buisness, and progress seems pointless when you can just take the enemy capital in the next mission rather than just go through another set of generic missions. There's the multiplayer of course which probably adds to the replayabilty, but I myself don't use that option much.

In conclusion: If you like RTS games and you like Dune (especially the movie) you'll love this. It's a great game with a good setting, just don't expect it to last long as it's repetitiveness shows.

Recap:
Gameplay ------ 8/10
Graphics ------ 7/10
Sound --------- 8/10
Difficulty ---- 3/10
Replayability - 6/10

Colonel Mullen's Overall Score: 8/10

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 07/15/01, Updated 07/15/01