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Gladius
A non-Star Wars LucasArts game that’s actually pretty good.
by Nicole Tanner
| PLATFORM:
PS2,
XBX, GC |
| PUBLISHER:
LucasArts |
DEVELOPER:
LucasArts |
GENRE:
RPG |
ESRB:
Teen |
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Let’s face it. LucasArts is known for mainly one thing –
Star Wars games, both the great ones and the ones that
have been mediocre at best. While the company has tried in the past
to break out of its one-franchise mode, it has often fallen short.
Need we mention RTX Red Rock? But now along comes Gladius,
a turn-based strategy game with RPG elements, and believe it or
not, it’s a lot of fun.
Enter the worlds of Nordagh and Imperia, two lands that have long
been at odds and had almost destroyed each other in a great war
that spawned the evil dragon-looking Dark God. But thanks to the
Valkyrie, keepers of the light affinity (and all women, I might
add) the Dark God was defeated and peace descended on the land.
But we all know men and their need for some good old testosterone-charged
fighting, so the lands now hold gladiator competitions to satisfy
their lust for blood. That’s where the story starts. It’s
your job to build a school of gladiators and travel all over the
land, fighting, and winning battles to make your way to the high
tournaments.
 You
have the option of playing the game as either Ursula, a girl from
Nordagh or Valens, a guy from Imperia, both with strange powers
they can’t exactly explain. I, of course, chose Ursula, and
she turned out to be the kind of gal I can really get behind. She’s
strong, independent and she can kick her brother’s ass. Not
to mention that she’s properly proportioned physically (read:
no monstrous breasts) and that’s always a plus in my book.
There are 35 different types of gladiators that you can either
recruit or encounter in battles, and their skills and abilities
are different enough to keep things interesting. You can battle
with everything from ferocious wolves and bears to spell-casting
channelers and oafish, powerful ogres. One of the more amusing character
classes is the Amazons, who have clever attacks like Flirt and Spark
that will incapacitate male enemies.
Although we probably don’t like to admit it, we’ve
all used our feminine whiles at one point or another and it’s
fun to see them translated into battle. However, there are also
some attacks by other classes that will make you think some second
grade boys were involved in the design process. I’ll just
say that they involve a certain bodily function that all males everywhere
seem to find overly amusing no matter what age they are.
Another great feature is that you can customize all of your gladiators
to look however you want. If you’re into the team spirit type
of thing, you can make all their clothes the same color. You can
also change hair color and skin color. It’s not mind-bogglingly
detailed, but it’s a nice little addition in the personalization
department.
The battle system itself is complex enough to keep things interesting,
while not making you feel like you’re in high school calculus.
Each gladiator can learn different skills by leveling up and different
kinds of gladiators get to use different types of weapons. You can
also learn “affinity” attacks, which are powerful attacks
based on one of four elements; fire, water, air and earth. The fighting
is turn-based, so you can take as much time as you need to plan
out your movements, but this also can be a drawback. In some of
the battles, you’re fighting multiple teams and you have to
sit and wait for all of them to take their turns, which can take
a long time, especially if there are witches or channelers involved.
One time, I actually got up, made myself a peanut butter sandwich
and grabbed a Dr. Pepper in the time it took all of my opponents
to cycle through their turns. But hey, if you’re into multi-tasking
while playing games, it could be the perfect situation for you.
 With
gameplay and variety being so good, it was disappointing to see
other elements of the game fall flat. The graphics aren’t
all that great, at times looking more like a PSOne than a big-budget
next-gen title. And they don’t even pick up in quality during
the cinematics, either. Ursula has two long braids hanging down
by her face, but unfortunately they look more like solid appendages
rather than hair. And some of the designs for the armor are downright
ridiculous. One of the best helmets you can buy for your gladiators
makes them look like the tin man from The Wizard of Oz.
The melodramatic music at first seems appropriate for the game,
but once it starts looping endlessly in the longer battles, you’ll
be reaching for your stereo remote. And the gladiators just say
ridiculous things in battle. Ursula will often say, “It’s
time to battle!” in the middle of a fight. Yeah, Ursula, we’ve
already been battling for about 15 minutes, but glad you’re
on top of things. But the most annoying are when the Amazons say
“I’m twice the woman you are” and when the channelers
say “Thanks for the charge” after stealing affinity.
But still you can spare yourself the torture of both of these features
by turning down the volume on the voices or the music in the options
menu.
And finally, we come to the story, which is all right in concept,
but hampered by clichéd dialogue and mediocre voice acting.
And hey, someone put cheesy romance in my videogame! There are scenes
between Ursuala and Valens that are almost as painful to watch as
Anakin and Padme were in Attack of the Clones. Hmmm. Both
products of the Lucas Empire. Is there a connection? I’ll
let you decide. But seriously, if I want to see this kind of crap,
I’ll go rent a Meg Ryan movie.
But all that said, I really enjoyed playing Gladius. Fundamentally
it’s a very solid game. If it wasn’t, I would not have
held my attention for nearly 50 hours of playtime.
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