I know it’s been a while since the last review, but shit happens right? A mixture of work and the fact Xenoblade Chronicles 3 dropped. So my precious free time and love can only be spread so far and my love is thin currently. I have a myriad of backlogged half completed played/reviewed games and one day my tasty folks I will get that completed for you all, but for now. A short review on Spartan, Total Warrior for the PS2. I may consider adding photos at a later date, but meh for now. Time is fleeting after all, and I certainly have better things to be doing like, completed Xenoblade Chronicles 3 or dying repeatedly in Into the Breach which I can’t recommend enough.
So with out further ado, Spartan Total warrior, is a simple premised game you play initially as a shirtless Spartan amongst shirt wearing Spartans’ for no other reason than to get your rippling tit muscles on show I believe. Aries talks to you and only you which I don’t think is ever explained but story convenience is of high necessity. You play as Spartans trying to push back an invading Roman army and along the way get mythical weapons and powers of the … GODS!
The game is linear, and simple to follow go here, unlock this etc, and along the way butcher hundreds of enemies. The hack and slash combat of this game is the highlight. It’s simple, no button faffing combos, just this one does heavy, this one does light, R2 is your equipped power. As a result with the ensuing tides of humanity you annihilate, racking up 500 odd kills per missions. The simplicity is what makes it engaging and fun. Everything is simple and effective and fairly bloody, where most special moves just explodes everyone’s heads for some reason.
Each area I feel is fairly well designed, and gives a grand scope of the areas. All the buildings and surroundings make for the battlefields to feel bigger that you are in a populated world not just a dead empty existence like the shit show of game Yu-Gi-Oh and the Falsebound Kingdom, God I fucking hate that game. The musou styled waves of enemies, give a sense that you are facing a devastating legion coming to take your land. The big bosses you fight from the Hydra, a giant bronze gladiator, Minotaur to name a few and always in these sort of games now, Aries, we can all thank God of War that. They all have a distinct feel to them so they don’t feel cut and paste.
There is a limited upgrade system in this game where you are awarded tokens at the end of each level, and in-between you can pick from health, damage and power to bump up a notch or two. With enemies dropping health and magic orbs or you can pray to one use shrine which are dotted about the body laden carnage to replenish in game. There’s a limited resupply of arrows, which can be found in chests, also you unlock arena hidden items in specific chests as well which can be used in one of the other modes of the game.
One final point of this game, it’s a feature I particularity enjoy but also baffles me, every enemy is named in this game. Even the bottom fodder which are there to feed your kill count. I’m not sure why this is a feature and to my knowledge only game I’ve played like it. That at some point during development the powers that be all sat around a table and decided to implement a name generator.
Overall I would rate this a sturdy 7/10, So Positively Tasty.
An easy going, simple fun hack and slash game that isn’t too taxing and can be played in small to big chunks with no real difficulty to it. It looks pretty good for it’s age and really it’s a shame that it didn’t do commercially or critically well. As it could’ve easily turned into a much better franchise having a sequel or two. As such fits in the long line of games I’d rather see bought back or remastered then a lot of the pointless games we get thrown at us nowadays. I’m looking at you The Last of Us.
Release Date 7th October 2005
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