Great War Nations: The Spartans

April 29, 2008 - First things first: Great War Nations: The Spartans is a terrible name, particularly since one of the two campaigns is actually about Alexander of Macedon who basically had nothing whatsoever to do with any Spartans. Nevertheless, The Spartans do manage to shine in the first campaign and there's a sincere attempt here to provide a convincing historical framework for the characters and missions. Whatever the case, we're still a bit confused by the name. The title is apparently the sequel to Ancient Wars: Sparta but I guess More Ancient Wars: Sparta didn't go over at the marketing meeting. The game was released in Europe as Fate of Hellas, which makes slightly more sense given Alexander's inclusion, but for whatever reason they've decided to call it Great War Nations: The Spartans, let's just get on with the review.
In this game you'll take charge of either the Spartan or Macedonian armies in one of two campaigns set during the bloody days of the Bronze Age. Each campaign progresses through a series of standard RTS missions where the main goal seems to be the destruction of the enemy base. Along the way you'll have to build farms and research new technologies, and even bribe allies and set fire to forests but let's be clear at the start, this game is about giving a guy a spear and having him go stab another guy. Perhaps one of the poorer aspects of the campaign design is that certain abilities and items that were available to you in previous missions are disabled in later ones purely to enforce arbitrary limitations on your strategies. For instance, you might be asked to use ladders to scale a wall in one mission only to find that they're simply not available in the next mission.

One of the more interesting aspects of Great War Nations is the way you create your troops. Rather than just coming pre-loaded with specific troop types, The Spartans gives you several blank slots that you can use to edit your own units. Once you pick a basic soldier type, you can then choose to equip them with any weapons you've researched (or collected from enemies). This means that you can start pumping out warriors armed with simple clubs and shields right away, or wait a bit and equip them with spears or swords and even tougher shields. And since you can actually equip multiple weapons, you can even have design troops that have three weapons -- one for fighting infantry, one for fighting cavalry and one for fighting at range. Of course, the more you pack onto a soldier, the more expensive they are to produce and the longer it takes them to train.
Of course, you have to manually switch weapons on the battlefield, which can be a bit confusing. Having to tell each of your soldiers to switch to their bows when attacking enemies they can't reach in melee seems a little unnecessary to us. Still, switching from one weapon to another, even for large groups of troops is relatively painless. There's a similarly involved mechanic for getting your troops on and off their mounts, which are treated as separate units.
It's much more difficult to loot the weapons from your enemies. The game seems to suggest that if you simply march a villager into the battlefield and give them a command to gather arms, that they'll happily march around picking up spare shields and swords and slings before bringing them back to your base either to be used to equip your forces or sold for cash. And while it ought to work that way, that's not been our experience. Instead, you'll have to hand select each and every item you want a villager to collect. It's not such a big deal with the giant shields, but it's incredibly hard to spot the tiny spears, a problem made particularly difficult by a camera system that requires you to use the keyboard and the mouse simultaneously if you want to rotate the view.

There are some other small problems with the basic interface as well. Some triggers are terribly difficult to set off, while that might require a bit of input from the player go off automatically. Additionally, the pathfinding can sometimes be downright atrocious. It's bad enough when units in the middle of your larger formations can't get out to the edges without you clearing a path for them manually, but the ships in the game just seem to float around as if they're on ice. Getting them into a reasonable formation, or even to move to a specific destination is an exercise in frustration. Losing ships to a smarter, better-prepared enemy is one thing, but losing them to bad steering is enough to send you digging around for your receipt.

When the formations work they provide a convenient way to keep your troops organized and oriented towards the enemy It's a simply system that gives you a fair bit of control over how you place troops. But for some reason, the formations only apply to troops at rest on the parade ground. Once you start moving or fighting, the whole concept of formations is completely meaningless. It's not that we don't expect units to mix it up a little once the battle is joined, but far too often units on the edges of your formation will break off to attack nearby enemies without any regard for your original dispositions.
Graphically, The Spartans is a rather attractive game. It certainly won't push the limits of your video card but the hundred-unit battles will still chop a bit even on higher end systems. The units are all highly detailed, from the transverse crests on their helmets to their red cloaks to the lambda on their shields. The units look great up close and from afar and their animations are realistic and dynamic. The environments are also nicely detailed, with a sort of Battle Realms style of atmosphere but lacking a bit of the life and animation found in that earlier title.

There are plenty of small touches here and there, however. Like the smiths coming out and testing the tips of the spears in the workshop or the ranged units heading out the practice range during training. These small signs of life don't amount to much individually but taken as a whole, they provide a solid feeling of energy to the game's setting. Throw in a few effects, like rockslides and burning trees, and you've got a game that compares favorably to many of the other RTS titles in this same setting.
The sound is also reasonably good. The effects of battle are satisfying and meaty and definitely help to support the on screen action. The martial music is equally thrilling and puts you right in the mood for some serious Bronze Age stabbings. Some may find the voice work a little exaggerated but I thought it struck the right tone overall, not too serious, but not played for laughs either.


Closing Comments
Terrible name aside, Great War Nations: The Spartans offers pretty much what we saw in Ancient Wars: Sparta. It has a unique troop creation system that lets players build exactly the types of armies they want and it doesn't look that bad either. But the pathing problems and the lack of excitement at the tactical level don't provide a strong enough framework for the good parts of the game to really shine through. If you're interested in ancient history you'll appreciate the attention to detail. Just don't expect the gameplay to be as captivating.





5.0
PresentationNot much of an update to last year's Ancient Wars. What is Alexander doing in a game about Sparta?
8.0
GraphicsNice detailing on the units with plenty of interesting animations back at the base. The world could use a bit more life.
7.0
SoundGood battle sounds and music. The voices are good but might be a bit broad for some tastes.
6.5
GameplayTroop creation is definitely fun but once the battle is joined things quickly degenerate into a predictable mush.
5.5
Lasting AppealTwo short campaigns seem to repeat the same types of encounters.
6.0Passable
OVERALL(out of 10 / not an average)