Funcom to Develop Games Based on Dune

Big news for fans of the science fiction series Dune. Legendary Entertainment and Herbert Properties LLC have reached a licensing agreement with developer Funcom to create video games based on the works of Frank Herbert’s DUNE.  The agreement is for at least three games, and it seems they will be headed for both consoles and PCs. Based on Funcom’s history it’s not surprising that the first game will apparently be a massively multiplayer online game of some kind. Several of Funcom’s previous games have been large open-world MMOs.

“Funcom has a strong history of working with beloved sci-fi/fantasy intellectual properties including our bestsellers Age of Conan and Conan Exiles.  So many of us at Funcom, myself included, are huge fans of Frank Herbert’s work and we are thrilled to have the opportunity to collaborate with Legendary to bring the iconic DUNE universe to life for gamers all over the globe.” Funcom CEO, Rui Casais

With the highly-anticipated Dune movie adaption currently in production at Legendary, the timing of this agreement makes perfect sense. All companies involved will be looking to increase brand recognition among the masses. It’s easy to imagine that we will be seeing a large amount of related merchandise and related products ahead of the film’s release next year. It will be interesting to see if these games adapted from the movie, or strictly from the books.

Dune actually has a pretty rich video game history. 1992’s Dune II helped formalize the standard for what would become the real-time strategy genre. There have been several other video games based on the franchise, though nothing released since 2001. The Dune universe has some incredibly deep lore that makes it a potential goldmine for video game ideas. Whether or not Funcom can effectively capitalize on that potential waits to be seen.