I had hopes for this game. The first time I saw it, I liked the art style, saw some fast paced combat, and figured that and had a good thing going with. University Of Findlay Faculty Handbook Northeastern. It was a campy little snibbit in the style of Flash Gordon or some other cheesy sci-fi flick of the 70's. Waldorf Lector Vocoder Rapidshare Library. While what I saw was pretty bare originally, I figured that having only seen some of the beginning levels, I could expect some pretty fun and interesting things from the final.
But now that I've played the game for more than a few hours, I can say that I'm not that impressed. While I still like the art style, the gameplay is just not up to my strategy bar favoring quick decision and heavily scripted levels instead of planning ahead and thinking about your approach. The Gladiators starts in the 70's on Earth. After discovering the black hole phenomenon, the US government decides to send an astronaut into one of them to check it out.
Sounds smart enough and safe enough, right? The 'volunteer' Greg D. Callahan along with his ship and crew get sucked through the thing only to end up on the other side of the galaxy. Upon arrival, a crew of rather unfriendly robot alien creatures kills pretty much everything on the ship except for Callahan. He's the trophy. Luckily for our wayward hero, a princess with gigantic hair steps in to give him a fighting chance. Apparently, her father just died, leaving a position open as ruler of the empire.
However, The Gladiators: Galactic Circus Games distinguishes itself with extremely fast-paced gameplay and an offbeat story. Unfortunately, technical problems and frustrating difficulty levels mar an otherwise solid game. IGN is the The Gladiators: Galactic Circus Games resource with reviews, wikis, videos, trailers, screenshots, cheats, walkthroughs, previews, news and release dates.
As with all good jobs, more than one person wants in. On this side of reality, such quibbles are decided via the most popular form of entertainment, the Deathbowl, a sci-fi equivalent to the Roman gladiatorial competitions a couple thousand years ago. The Deathbowl plays out over a set of games where gladiators battle it out for supremecy in front of throngs of bloodthirsty fans. In this case, three gladiators are chosen. One champion for each contender for the crown, winner takes all.
So Callahan is recruited by the princess because apparently nobody else wants to give it a go. Who would want to work for a hot blue princess with tentacle hair? Where's Captain Kirk when you need him.
This story is told via crappy cutscenes and painful voicework both during matches and in between them. While the developers were trying their best for 70's camp and witty dialogue, you get little to none of each delivered in terrible style by the voice actors. I can't remember laughing once through the game. Mostly I remember the headache that the announcer's voice has given me over the last few days. While I normally can appreciate the fun awfulness of B movies, like I'm fairly sure this was shooting for, I found nothing entertaining from a cheesy or quality standpoint.
Characters are forgettable and boring with only the barest of personalities. While the actual game looks pretty good with bright colors and good model work, the cutscenes in between levels suffer from bland environments, camerawork, and the lack of moving mouth parts. When the magical gladiator Fargass stands there with his stupid mouth sagging open with a blank stare on his face while trying to say something irrefutably evil, it just comes across as flat. But like I said, The Gladiators looks pretty good while playing. The worlds are created with a certain level of detail. All of the units are nicely constructed with colors and textures that hide any imperfections pretty well. Likewise, structures and dense foliage are put together well to create a lush and complex landscape.
