Lost Atari 2600 Dune Prototype Discovered

Thanks to AtariAge for its new story revealing a long-lost Atari 2600 prototype for a Dune game has been discovered, almost 20 years after it was scrapped. The game is "based on the 1984 movie of the same name [from Frank Herbert's books]" and "was to be an action/adventure style game similar to Atari's classic Adventure", but, according to an in-depth analysis at AtariProtos.com, "only preliminary coding had been started before Jack Tramiel shut down 2600 game development and fired most of the staff." Still, what other game you know depicts Baron Harkonnen as a smiley face?

Weirding Modules

[Anonymous Coward]

When I read the books, I always wondered how the Weirding Modules would be rendered in a video game version.

Can anybody confirm whether they made it into this prototype?

Re:Weirding Modules

[Anonymous Coward]

When I read the books, I always wondered how the Weirding Modules would be rendered in a video game version.

Ho ho you fraud! The weirding modules were never in ANY of the books, they were a David Lynch Invention(tm) for the movie!

Re:Weirding Modules

[Repton]

They're in the official comic book...

(which is almost completely impossible to understand if you don't already know what's going on)

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

How close to the movie?

[Kris_J]

Does it have the annoying voice-overs that try to pack in narrative elements from the book that are more or less unecessary in the movie? (I'm assuming this is the Dune movie with a young Sting and an even younger Patrick Stewart.)

Those aren't narrative elements...

[freeBill]

...they were internal dialogue and translations of sign-language codes. In other words the books had even more voice-overs than the movie. You just didn't notice them.

Any Dune movie that didn't have some way to represent the internal dialogue wouldn't be a Dune movie.

Early Prototype

[Lshmael]

This game is so unfinished, it's not even funny. The only enemy *not* to be represented by a smiley face is the "Baron's Guards", who appear in one screen. Add more unfinished graphics (i.e. Fremen also using wonderful smiley face, Princess Chani represented by a square - along with guns, ornithopters, and various other inanimate objects), a thoroughly ugly interface and screen, and you could have a good concept of any unfinished game, whether it be from 1984 or 2003.

Heck, if they did not explicitly tell you the game was based on Dune, I wouldn't have known.

It could have been good.

[AtariAmarok]

It could have been good, you know. Remember the imminently fun Atari 2600 version of "Superman". Compare this to the much better looking for very dull (flying Supes through the deserted city gets old) "Superman" game on the N-64.

Those graphics

[GuyMannDude]

Still, what other game you know depicts Baron Harkonnen as a smiley face?

Yo, peep this: Evil Otto from Berzerk was nothing more than a smiley face and he was one bad ass dope motherfucker that had no problems going all Jet Li down on your punk human ass! You best be showing them smiley face dudes a little more respect, bro.

..."was to be an action/adventure style game similar to Atari's classic Adventure"...

Considering that the dragon looked an awful lot like a chicken in Adventure, I'd hate to think how those Dune worms would have ended up...

GMD

Boss Smiley

[AtariAmarok]

There is one very evil smiley face, which I believe is part of the Sandman comics: "The Boss appears as a human male in a suit, with a large, perfectly spherical head and an overlarge "smiley-face" expression." [sjgames.com]

He first appeared in the PREZ comics in the early 1970s from DC.

Re:Those graphics

[Rimbo]

"Considering that the dragon looked an awful lot like a chicken in Adventure, I'd hate to think how those Dune worms would have ended up..."

This is as good a time as any to bring up this:

http://www.homestarrunner.com/main13.html

Hover thy mouse over each button in order, finishing with "e-mail."

Priceless.

Only one Dune game...

[freeBill]

...will ever matter: Eon's multiplayer board game.

Quite possibly the best multiplayer game ever designed. It did an outstanding job of reproducing the political intrigue that made the book interesting.

Re:Only one Dune game...

[drinkypoo]

While it bears only passing resemblance to the books/movies, and has none of the feel, dune 2 was a great game. Its engine was recycled for use in Command and Conquer, and Red Alert. It was available (at least) for Amiga and PC, the Amiga version of course looked and sounded nicer because at the time using a PC for a game machine was like using an Atari 2600 for a word processor.

Re:Only one Dune game...

[bitrott]

I rather like the board game based on the movie. Light RPG elements and high replayability.

Cryo game 1992

[LarsWestergren]

Does anyone else remember the great Atari/Amiga/DOS Dune adventure/strategy game by the French company Cryo from 1992? It was based partly on the book and partly on the Lynch film. I believe the same company tried again a year ago or so ago with "Frank Herbert's Dune", this time more based on the Sci-Fi channel mini-series. The reviews this time was more so-so.

The best thing about the original game was the atmosphere, helped along by the great soundtrack and the impressive architecture...

You can download