Barkhan

The 90s were a unique era in gaming that many people remember fondly. It was a time of creative freedom, bad CG, and rapidly growing tech. Over three decades later, games modeled after this time frame but without the frustrations are becoming popular. Barkhan is one of those modern games designed to look like its from the 90s. Barkhan is a Real-Time Strategy game that has you scrambling to build tech and claim resources before your enemies do.

Choose Between Three Clans

Barkhan is divided into three clans, all with their own unique take on how the world operates. The Clan of Power for examples, focuses on heavy armored vehicles. They try to use raw power to overwhelm their opponents. The Clan of Will aims to use speed to win. They build their tech as fast as possible, hoping to win by attacking before the other clans are ready.

The Clan of Trickery relies on fancy technology to try and win. They have powerful weapons like Plasma cannons that work in unique ways to try and win against the other clans.

Underwhelming Graphics and Gameplay

Barkhan was obviously inspired by games like Dune 2000 or Dune 2. Unfortunately, it doesn’t quite measure up, even to these older games. One playthrough of the demo shows problems almost immediately. Players are unable to cancel buildings they have started building, air units are far too fragile, there’s no auto-repair option, and many other problems. It’s possible that this is just a limit of the demo, but with such a short time before the game is released it seems unlikely that everything will be completely fixed. On top of the gameplay issues, the graphics also aren’t much to look at. This may be intentional—it’s modeled after games that came out in the 90s after all, but even for a 90s game they look rough.

Decent Sound

Although the demo has a lot of problems with it, the game does have a few good points to balance it out. The sound on the game is well done, and the developers thoughtfully used a sound based warning system for bombs that help you get your units out of the way.

The game also allows you to manage power decently, with the ability to shut down power to different buildings should you start running low on energy.

Whether Barkhan is worth buying or not will depend entirely on how much polish is added between the demo and its release. It’s possible that the demo is just a little rough around the edges, and the released game has all their problems fixed.

Pros:

• Decent sound
• Excellent power management
• 90s style gameplay

Cons:

• Air units are too fragile
• No auto-repair
• First person to amass units wins—no strategy needed

In the strategic action game Barkhan, a distant planet is divided into zones of influence and three powerful robotic clans fight for limited resources.

Gameplay:

• Dunes lie, sand giants. The sun heats the surface. The distant future, the era of space exploration. Fight for one of three clans.
• Produce future tanks and storm enemy cities
• Air transports will turn the tide of battle. Maneuverable, but vulnerable. Take advantage of its strengths
• Upgrade and strengthen your units to win