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Dune Awakening Beta Weekend: Get Ready!

Originally posted on Total Apex Gaming | By Mollie Dominy | Last updated Apr 27, 2025 7:31 PM ET

If you’ve watched the trailer, kept up with all the announcements, and are making sure your setup is ready for the upcoming new addition to your gaming inventory. You’re ready for the sands of Arrakis to embed themselves into your soul! Dune Awakening is finally giving players a peek into the spice vault!

Yes, they are letting players get a small taste of Dune Awakening, and it kicks off May 9-12. It’s not a stress test—it’s a real-life slice of the full game!

No limited previews, no NDAs (which is amazing). This is full of Act 1 content, up to 20 hours of gameplay. This allows players to stream, post, and flex their survival skills online!

So, use this weekend to get used to the mechanics before the full launch on June 10, 2025

How To Get In On the Beta

There are a couple of ways to secure a spot for a deluge of player surge in:

Request Access on Steam: Wishlist Dune Awakening and hit the “Request Access” button for a chance to get in early.

Tune into the Global LAN Party: On May 10, Funcom’s throwing a massive live event from London and PAX East. If you’re lucky, you can receive one of tens of thousands of beta keys that are going to be handed out during the broadcast—so if you miss it, that’s on you, my dudes!

If you’re lucky enough to be at PAX East in person? Well, you’re one lucky duck, aren’t you? You can swing by the booth and grab some hands-on time with the devs, probably walking away with some serious bragging rights.

New Story Trailer Sets the Stage

(Video of Dune Awakening Story Trailer courtesy of Funcom)

Alongside the beta hype, Funcom dropped a brand-new story trailer—and yeah, it’s exactly the kind of cinematic grit you want from a Dune game.

Your mission? Find the Fremen. Awaken the Sleeper. Survive the politics, the betrayals, and the hellscape that is Arrakis. The trailer teases a full roster of factions, cutthroat alliances, and the kind of desperate survival that fits right into Frank Herbert’s nightmare vision. And based on the tone?
Expect the story to hit just as hard as the sandworms do.

What You’ll Actually Get To Play

This isn’t a tech demo. This is real gameplay:

Up to 20 hours of Act 1: Survival mechanics, questlines, faction politics, and more.
Open World Exploration: A massive slice of Arrakis to scout, scavenge, and survive.
Faction Reputation System: Align yourself with Great Houses like Atreides or Harkonnen—or stay rogue and fend for yourself.
PvE and PvP Options: Fight the environment, fight the players, or just fight to stay alive. Your call.

The beta is designed to give players a full taste of how brutal (and addicting) the final release is aiming to be

Final Thoughts: Don’t Sleep On This

Dune Awakening is slowly becoming more than “Dune but make it Fortnite.” It’s bigger, smarter, and sandier (lol). This beta weekend is your first real shot to see what Funcom’s been cooking! So mark those calendars. Pack those supplies. Ready those digits! This fun hasn’t even begun yet! Maybe you’ll learn how to dodge a sandworm or two!

This article first appeared on Total Apex Gaming and was syndicated with permission.

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