Does not meet the expectations, but it is nonetheless worth playing.
In this game you play as ‘the Spartan’, who doesn’t know his true identity and has to figure this out by participating the war between the two empires. You’ll begin as a recruit, and after completing the levels you’ll become stronger, acquire more weapons and increase in rank. Although you don’t really notice that you’re an officer, when becoming one.
In the single player you will first be introduced to the story and immediately after that, you will fight the Romans along with your fellow soldiers. The missions are varied from escorting people to annihilating all enemies in a room and beating down the enemy’s leaders. Also there are many different armies to defeat like the skeleton armies and the zombie armies. In the beginning of the game you’ll be contacted by Ares, the God of War who makes a deal with you and ‘assists’ you, while defeating enemy armies. Of course you have to fight a massive amount of enemies, which keep pouring in, until you defeated them all, or after you accomplished a goal. Some enemies are only concentrating their attacks on you, so expect enemies from all over the screen. And others will keep chasing you, until you defeat them.
Each time you complete a level you’ll acquire a certain amount of coins, mostly six, which you can be used for levelling up. Also new weapons will be acquired after some levels. Later on, you will be able to cycle through your weapons, so your strategy can be decided. The gameplay isn’t solid though; the camera is bad and a few glitches and bugs can be discovered easily. For example, a possibility of being killed in a scene.
In the story mode you play as ‘The Spartan’ who has several moves, like the shield bash, rage attacks and the use of special powers, varied from turning every enemy soldier in a certain range into stone to instant kills with your weapon of choice. But you’ll have to discover these moves by yourself, mostly by trying everything out, since there is only a small tutorial through the game itself, and not everything will be explained in it. But of course, the game doesn’t only contain fighting. Also other features, like collecting secret things or defending an area by using ballistas have taken a place in the game.
This story mode contains numerous levels, which are all well divided. The only problem is that you can’t save yourself, it can only auto save. So it can be very frustrating if you have low health and if there aren’t any health shrines for you to use or if it looks impossible to complete a certain objective. The graphics are reasonable, not really good, but not bad either. And that isn’t bad at all, since graphics aren’t the most important feature in a game. But with the reasonable graphics, the game runs smooth and has no problems in loading through the levels or while playing. So this is a bad thing, that turns into a good thing.
The story in the single player isn’t very good, it’s even very bad. Where you expect to play a game, which is set in the time of the Spartans and the Romans, you get a game which is only focused on massive armies. And the dialogues and the speeches are even worse. Also the music doesn’t fit in the game. Of course orchestral music, like in Rome: Total War or Age of Mythology was expected. Instead of smooth music, hard and ‘rock’ music substituted it. They weaken the game and that’s too bad, since the game had a lot of potential in becoming a good game. If you get tired of the reasonable story mode, you can choose for the arena mode, where you can unlock bonus items, by collecting secret things in the story mode. You can choose between several arenas, fight different armies and participate battles at different difficulties. This is a unique mode in the single player, which can be enjoyed. Try to survive waves of soldiers and get many points, so you can be listed in the high scores. So, my conclusion is: if you’re interested in hack ‘n slash game, this game should be in your collection. If you want to buy this game, only because you’re interested in mythology or the war between the Spartans and the Romans, then you’ll be disappointed with this game. But still it’s a pretty good game, which can be enjoyed by most people.