A combination of bad voice acting and bad writing gives us unconvincing, bland readings at best, and wince-inducing performances at worst. Speaking of units, most of the unit speech is-I won't mince words-awful. On top of that, the game maps, while nice enough to look at, are less than inspired. But then, Sparta can't seem to quite decide whether it wants to be tactical or strategic things like heroes and customizable units seem to say вЂњMicromanage!вЂќ, things like resource infrastructure and economy management scream вЂњMacromanage!вЂќ, and all the while the dumb-as-a-doorknob unit AI doesnвЂ™t help at all. For an otherwise tactically-oriented game, Sparta takes, in this reviewer's opinion, an unnecessarily long time to get the player's infrastructure established and start producing soldiers. If you're paying enough attention to the beautifully-rendered scenery to appreciate it, you aren't playing properly.Д«ut then, given the wind-up time in your average skirmish or multiplayer game, you may very well spend a lot of your games looking at the scenery. And then there's the stuff about trees and grain fields and wind and waves, but come on, this is a war game. While not what the hype promised, both the graphics and physics engines are superb walls and buildings sag and crumble as they shrug off siege weapons, buildings look oh-so-pretty as they catch fire and burn to the ground, dead soldiers are sent flying back with satisfying, if totally unrealistic force, or simply fall from their horses as a sadistic giggle escapes your lips. While it loses points for accuracy regarding soldiers and historical details, units and structures in Sparta do manage to capture the architectural feel of the three nations. It's, quite simply, madness.Д«ut now that we've got the obligatory вЂњ300вЂќ joke out of the way, let's get on with the review. Units in Ancient Wars: Sparta can be grouped into formations, but still fight as individuals вЂ“ a glaring historical inaccuracy in this setting. My one quip in this area is the lack of a phalanx in some form or another вЂ“ since the phalanx was, traditionally, the backbone of Sparta's army. Spears, for example, are more effective when battling mounted units, while swords excel at defeating footsoldiers.

This feature allows you to mass-produce cheap infantry to deal with a sudden strike or replace unexpected losses, while constructing powerful, more expensive soldiers during lulls in the action, each customized with a number of ranged or melee weapons each with unique properties. Though this is commonplace in modern turn-based titles, and even tactical real-time ones, it's an uncommon thing to see in a strategic-level RTS (though it's definitely a bright spot). There's your Age of Empires element the Warcraft III bit comes from the inclusion of historical figures, notably the Spartan king Leonidas, as вЂњheroesвЂќ that become more powerful as they gain combat experience.ДЄs for more mundane soldiers, infantry are built from customizable вЂњtemplatesвЂќ and their equipment is unlocked through research. Right off the bat, Sparta loses points for historical inaccuracy I doubt the armies of Sparta, Persia, or Egypt constructed a small city every time they went on campaign. What I got was more like Age of Empires meets Warcraft III, with a sprinkling of ancient Greece for flavour. Now, I came into this expecting something like Rome: Total War, a tactical-level RTS interspersed with turn-based empire management. While this model was what made the genre great, Sparta's core gameplay is essentially a giant step backwards to the late 1990's, but with better graphics. It's a very basic, cut-and-dry RTS of Ye Olde Schoole: Build a base, collect Food/Wood/Gold, build an army, attack another army. Ancient Wars: Sparta doesn't really bring anything new to the RTS genre. Something like Supreme CommanderвЂ™s sheer scale that lets you zoom all the way out to see the entire battlefield, or Warcraft III's blend of RTS and RPG elements, or the fully three-dimensional playing field that Homeworld became known for. These days, any Real-Time-Strategy title needs something to set itself apart from the competition. It's a case where the whole is less than the sum of its parts, probably due to the fact that most of the parts are quite dated.'

'While Sparta may look nice, it feels as though somebody took great elements from all over the RTS genre and put them all together in one game.

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