New Games on The Great Games Experiment http://www.greatgamesexperiment.com/css/logo.jpg en-us "Dune II: Battle for Arrakis" is a real-time strategy game based upon the 1984 movie set in Frank Herbert's popular sci-fi universe. Released in 1992, Dune II proved to be successful with gamers and critics alike due to its addictive playability and innovative game design - the gameplay has been emulated many times since. Dune II led the huge upsurge in popularity the genre has enjoyed right up until this day and is considered to be the Godfather of real-time strategy games.

The plot consists of three waring parties named House Atreides, House Harkonnen and House Ordos. All are vying for control of the most important planet in the known universe - Arrakis, better known as Dune. The planet Arrakis contains the only known source of the valuable and essential spice called Melange. Melange is the primary resource collected in-game and it funds the war effort of each house - the more spice one possesses, the more successful one becomes.

The game is played from a top-down perspective and can be controlled entirely by mouse. The aim is to build an army of a big enough size to seize land, eliminate any opposing threat and ultimately expand your dynasty. Each map contains spice deposits that need to be collected via harvesters. The spice is then transported to a refinery and tuned into credits, which can then be spent on the expansion of base and the construction of more units. As the game progresses more technologically advanced units and structures become available, changing the dynamics of the battlefield.

The game was re-made twice by Westwood though only the original was ported to the Sega Mega Drive, Amiga, Archimedes and Risc PC range of RISC OS computers.

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