It's a very nice game. Like other reviewers said, it's a puzzle game. You have to figure out a way to save the tribe from natural disasters such as monsoon and volcano eruptions. To do that, you have to expand your tribes and get some power boosts. It'll get repetitive at times, but over all it's a mind-boggling game. The "sandbox" game is actually a level and can be completed, so it's not completely open-ended game (though it's a circle of life).

This game is way too easy for anyone who is experienced in RTS! There's often only one way to solve a problem (and often revolves around building a bridge to the next totem). And often the task is so straightforward and all that's left is for the player to practice how to use the mouse (and sometimes the keyboard).

The game mechanism is too simplistic and often it feels like someone else is doing the work for me.

I mean, if the people can build houses instantly and then all of a sudden a hoard of people appear out of nowhere what is the point of having me play at all??? I bet the developers didn't think about this question too hard lol.

Now, the pro side of this game is that the graphics is better than B&W2. You get to see awesomely stunning tsunami and other natural disasters again and again =]

Whats great:

The game itself is alot of fun in the beginnig since you get to manipulate sand, water nature etc,

Whats not so great: After a couple of missions the game start to be repetitive. There is often only one solution to the puzzels in the game and therefore the game gets dull really quick. Ubisoft has abandoned the game and no longer supports it with patches and fixes even though it still has mouse control problems on PC with M/K and random framedrops.

Overall I will not recommend this game until ubisoft gets the mouse control fixed on PC + there is 0 replay value after the game is completed. The game has some random framedrops on both my GTX 285 and GTX 670 both on a I7 860 @ 2.93.

Graphically From Dust is quite good., the water physics are really amazing, however I think the game gets quite boring very fast.

I was waiting for something in the lines of Populous, but nope, as others already said it's a puzzle game.

Still, I do not regret getting it, it's good to see new games than the usual fps's in the market.

From Dust is an incredibly unique puzzle game, in that rather than trying to work your way through different environments, your job is to allow your villagers to make their own way through various hazards, by manipulating the form and physical properties of the islands on which they live.

From Dust sees you doing things as simple as draining a pool of water so that a villager can walk to the bottom, or as insane as turning the entire ocean into a viscous fluid, allowing your villagers to walk in between massive walls of slowly-flowing water.

With beautiful graphics, and a catchy, yet unobtrusive soundtrack of drumbeats and chanting, From Dust can be as fun to watch as it is to play.

The only real gripe I have is that on occasions, the controls used in the PC version can feel clunky or unintuitive, but after playing for a while, it isn't much of an issue to get past.

I have to give it 5 stars for what it is. If you like God games like Populous or Black and White then you will like this niche game as well. Expect to play it only once so buy it when it goes on sale.

This game was interesting. I don't regret buying it but I still wish there was a little more to it. You play as these lost people trying to find their ancestors last place of refuge (hoping they still live there) in a world that is unstable. You save your people from floods, volcanoes, and all sorts of natural disasters. You gain the ability to fend off these disasters in various ways as you move along, and it can be very challenging protecting your people sometimes.

It was a fun little game. It's too bad it got a bit repetitive (especially with those dang cutscenes; they traveled through that one tunnel soooo many times). It was still fun though, so if it look interesting to you, I'd say buy it. I hated the drm with this game though. It's that annoying 'always have to be online' drm and it impeded my play more than once. :(

A decent, if not short, puzzle solving physics game that attempts to blur a line between puzzle game and god game. However, it feels like the game does neither very well.

The physics are stellar and the level that lets you just mess around is the best level in the entire game. You get to fully explore all the different abilities and it's easy to waste a lot of time in it.

However, the game has some issues too. The forced DRM which Ubisoft said it wouldn't come with is highly irritating, the graphics aren't optimized for PC and you can't change them in anyway except resolution, the controls aren't particularly good or changeable, and the unskippable cutscenes are a hassle to sit through each time you mess up. It is pretty short as well.

Overall, it could have been so much better than what it was but as it is, it's hard to recommend.

The graphics and physics in this game are amazing. The sound in this is pretty good, and i enjoy the gameplay. A good game to play if you don't feel like playing something dripping in a story line.

I've only played through a handful of the missions and so far it's been quite a bit of fun! The game is amazing to look at and to watch the physics of the dirt, water, etc... just awesome stuff. I haven't played the Sandbox mode yet but I imagine that will ultimately be more fun than the objective'd missions, which seem fairly linear - Figure out the goal, figure out the mechanic, do the thing, win. All in all though not a bad game and in addition to not being a bad game it is an incredibly pretty game.

From Dust is a relatively short game (only taking 5-6hrs) but is a very addictive game. The game is a "spiritual successor to populous" according to the developers and you can definately tell its influence throughout the game. The game itself consists of several levels where you play a god trying to lead a bewildered people out of ignorance and into a utopia. But along the way you will have to help save these hapless vilagers from all sorts of troubles from valcanoes, floods, tsunamis, and other disasters using only your god-ability of moving elements (ie: dirt, water, lava) and other god-like powers.

While the levels are not timed, time is always of the essence as the land forms around you before your eyes, being formed and carved by the very floods and lava that you are trying to protect your people from. A flood can come in and redirect the flow of lava which will then ignite the forests which will then burn down your village (you get the idea). All of this to get to the final level where you have mastered the elements and are able to play in the game's sandbox mode.

While the game can be rather frustrating at times, it is definately worth a play. Especially if you grew up and loved playing the populous series or are a fan of any of the god game genre.

The premise of From Dust is a puzzle game, within a sandbox environment. The game contains a story mode and challenge mode, (challenges being unlocked throughout story mode) story mode is 13 missions long.

Each Story mode mission has the same goals, help your mean reach each totem to create a village, which progressively get more challenging and complex. Different missions requiring you to bend rivers out of your men's path or create walls of lava to shield your village from tsunamis.

Along with each mission are unlockables called 'memories of the tribe' which describe the history of the people you are helping or the world they inhabit. These are unlocked from either helping your tribe spread plants across the map to a certain percentage, or finding smaller and harder to reach totems.

The reward at the end of story mode is close to a sandbox map where you can create volcanoes, mountains and summon tsunamis. And by that time you have unlocked most of the challenges. For £11.95 this game has given me plenty of hours of enjoyment. Although not very repayable I can go back and play through some missions and mess around, and spend hours building and messing around with my powers on the last mission.

Although be aware that this game requires an active internet connection to start up.

It is not a God sim game as I hoped for. But for the price, I'm content with it's puzzle solving gameplay.

The graphics are done pretty well, including with the liquid physic in this game. The downside that you need internet connection to run this game (Typical Ubisoft DRM), and there isn't a lot you can do with your limited power.

If you had been waiting for a new "god" game along the lines of Popolous or even Magic Carpet - keep waiting.

From Dust is a puzzle game, kind of a realtime Myst.

If you use your "powers" in the right sequence, you win the scenario. Otherwise you lose.

The graphics are pretty, the water/fire/lava/earth physics are great - I'd just like to have a GAME to go with these.

Poorly otimized, terrible control, fraudulent advertising, mediocre graphics, laggy gameplay. What's not to like? Last purchase from Ubi for me. And probably last purchase from Gamersgate too because online vendors are just a helping hand in the growing habit of false advertisement and the publishing of cheap console ports that have a marketing budget of §1 Mio and a development budget of $10.000.

While it is an original game, with some nice possibilies, there are some nasty issues with this game:

- The Always-On DRM from Ubisoft is mighty annoying. It takes close to half a minute before it loads and let's you play the game.

- The controls are annoying, move the mouse just a tiny bit and the game will scroll the camera like crazy.

- Lack of graphics options

- It just does not run as smooth as it should.

- Unskippable cut-scene's.

Overall its a good game, but requires an internet connection at all times to play it which some people aren't too fond of and the controls take some time to get used too. However the special abilities and ways to manipulate the landscape make up for the above mentioned. In my opinion a sandbox mode would make the game a bit better and make up for its somewhat poor story mode.

A nice game that could have been so much more. But with two big flaws, it's short. And the controls seems to be ripped right out of an xbox - don't think the developers even tried to play it on a computer w Mouse/Keyboard. There is many ways to get a good controller, but they didn't even bother it seems. To bad, it could have been "goty" but in this state... But if you can overlook the stupid controls you will find a nice game in it.

It's good at what it does, but it's not what we all assumed it would be. In From Dust, you assume the persona of the "Breath", the spiritual power of the people that can manipulate the landscape in a limited way. The gameplay itself is very much reminiscent of a puzzle game. While you do not have complete control over the environment, the "Breath" presents you with a set of tools with which to solve the problems that face your villagers. The aim is to allow them to settle each "totem" site with a village and activate the portal to the next level. I toyed around a bit, though I have not yet finished the game, and the consequences and results of certain actions are quite fascinating and very complex, sometimes with quite a long mean time for it to happen. The graphics themselves are quite enjoyable, and the art and imagery they've built up for the villagers is unique and engaging.

While it is most certainly not the next God Game that was implied and that we had hoped, it is a very engrossing puzzle game with a complex physics engine, beautiful graphics, and a much more complex environment than could have been expected. For my personal taste, there isn't much replay value, but for the $15.00 release price tag, it is definitely worth a purchase.

gotta agree with fyendiar. when someone says "god" game i expect something along the lines of populous or black and white. if you want to move dirt around then go with this game

http://www.gamersgate.com/DD-DIGGER/digger-simulator

no consequences in story mode to letting your villages or tribesman be burned, drowned, doused in sand or lava. i cant see the challenge maps adding anything to the gameplay except a time limit. cool trailer but very shallow gameplay. two stars because i like the physics.

After play for a while, I have to say this game is not so good like I hoped, but it's not bad. The main problem is I thought this game was a new Populous. And that is the problem. From Dust have amazing things, the Tsunami for example, is spectacular, but after to go through mission after mission you feel like if this game had been developed by National Geographic or something like that. Nature, the seas, the fire, and well, all that is very pretty but you really don't know what is the reason of the adventure. Yes, they're looking for the ancestors, but all is so mystical that I think the devs lost themselves with so much mysticism. After that, there is not any argument or any explication. I'm at mission six (of twelve I think), and I feel I'm playing the tutorial yet. The game doesn't finish to explode and offer something solid. To be honest, if I could go back to the past, I wouldn't buy this game. It's not bad, like I said, the game offers good things, but if you compare this game with Populous or Black and White, is like a tecnical demo instead a game.

It take about 6-7 hours to complete the game, but that is not so bad compared to the relative low price. The game it self is actualy quite good and its interesting to use the "natual" powers as a kind of god, altering the enviroment and helping the tripe to reach 4 totems in each level and the final gate to the next world.

The game have some very advanced phsycics and its beautifull to watch the lava or tesunamis hit the islands and follow the terrain. The same is the case with when you build and help your tripe with sand, lava ect..

I think its a great little game.

I can recommend this game to everyone.

Note..: be aware that is uses ubisoft DRM.. But the game install fine and run fine.

I haven't played far, but the gameplay seems fun and original and it's nice to see a return of the god genre, but I stopped playing due to frustrations with this PC port.

-The framerate is locked to 30fps.

-The controls are awkward with a mouse. Instead of a mouse pointer, you get this odd "snake" thing which follows the ground. It's sluggish to control, it's got a tiny bounding box and it can be hard to see sometimes. It's baffling they didn't add a simple mouse pointer instead.

-There's only a few graphical options. You can change resolution and if it should played in windowed mode, and that's it. Textures are also rather blurry, obviously same assets as on consoles.

Maybe the above issues is something one can get used to, but they are inexcusable. Developers should put more effort into their ports.

Honestly I Played it for a while and I couldn't get used to the controls. Not that they were bad... just stiff. It really felt like I was playing the game on xbox even though I was using a mouse and keyboard. Other than that the thing that annoyed me was the villagers. They have to move from one place to another and get stuck on nothing. While they're standing there derping around a flood comes and washes them away or something.

It was a fun enough game for the price. If you get it I would recommend either getting it on xbox arcade or using a gamepad for the pc because this game was clearly made for consoles without any thought at all to the PC gamer.

There are not many good God games out there these days. The only last proper good one we had was Black and White 2 but all that's behind us now except when From Dust came along.

Taking the role of a Breath, which is sort of like a God role, you lead a tribe of people to different regions filled with natural disasters and wonders. Mother nature challenges you and you must use your God powers to ensure that your tribe get through safely.

Basically the main goal in the game is to lead a tribe to village totems. Different totems give you different abilities which you can use to overcome any challenge you are faced with.

Definitely one of the great, underrated games out there and is a must buy for the price it's asking.

The graphics are good and the game is nice, but there is a DRM. Ubisoft declared that there wouldn't be DRM to this game. But to play it, you need to be connected EVERY TIME. The difference between this game and Assassins Creed 2 is that this one doesn't stop if you lose connection. Another thing is that it's not warned that we'd need connection EVERY TIME, like it is in Assassins Creed 2 (A PERMANENT HIGH SPEED INTERNET CONNECTION AND CREATION OF A UBISOFT ACCOUNT ARE REQUIRED TO PLAY THIS VIDEO GAME AT ALL TIMES ). If you (that paid for this game) don't like to feel like a thief or pirate, don't buy this game or anyone from Ubisoft.

It's a fun little game, but nowhere near what I was hoping for in a God Game. It mostly just a puzzle game. It's worth the low cost of the game as long as you don't expect Populous type of gameplay. Your main objective is to guide your people to new totems by opening pathways and protect them from the power of nature.

If you are looking for a God Game, like I was and still am, keep looking. If you are looking for a fun little puzzle game with God-like powers then you found one!

Very nice game with pretty graphics and complexity. You never know which element of nature is going to get the best of you. Very well worth the money i say if you like the "God like" genre.