There's a time and a place when everyone in the neighborhood joins hands and prepares for a round of "No!
I'M
Spartacus". I don't try to understand it, I simply
accept it as one of those things. It brings communities closer together, so I might as well just
go along with it. Now it looks like Kodiak Interactive is here to help. They've
got a Roman Chariot racing game on the way to the XBox with Circus
Maximus: Chariot Wars. Will it be the poster child for the I'm Spartacus, Ben Hur-ian, Life of Brian jet set
with their fancy shoes and toe-tapping ways? Only time will tell.
The game is shaping up to be a hybrid between vehicular combat and straight ahead racing. Here's how it works. Players have two characters in their chariot, one
is the driver, the other is the warrior who rides shotgun (no more puns, I promise), attacking the competitors when they get close enough. From there players will be
able to switch to and fro between these two while tearing through the tracks. When attacking another chariot its open game what players choose to whack at, be it
the other warrior, the driver, or even the horses, all with the expected assortment of weapons from the times, such as swords, arrows, and
so on. But for those who
feel like having a more gentlemanly whirl around the tracks there will be options to race without the bloodshed, though that seems to go against the whole point of the
game. All together players will be able to choose from 20 characters hailing from 10 of the regions held by the Roman Empire, so expect to see a wide range of
selection in the character department.
With the combat elements included in Circus Maximus there will be a lot more twitch play than your typical racing title. Instead of just worrying about lining yourself
up for the corners, players will constantly need to worry about the computer controlled characters pelting them. This can be doubly troublesome if it starts sending
the chariot off balance because the last thing players need is to spill all over the course. With this equilibrium of the
chariot comes another interesting aspect of the
game, players can have their team lean into turns allowing for faster cornering. Then there's the juggling the control of the warrior and the driver which looks
complicated to say the least. But if it proves overwhelming, multiplayer mode actually allows for shared control of the chariot team, so one player can take the reigns
while the other takes the spear, right up to there being four players,
two per team. Besides the core action of hacking away at opponents while trying to navigate the race track it looks like Kodiak is making a
concerted effort to add little extras every which way to really keep the gameplay fast paced for this title.
All of this thrashing will take place on a good half dozen tracks strewn throughout the Empire, from the Cirucs Maximus itself to the frigid landscapes of the
Gauls. While racing there will be plenty of power-ups to augment players' chariot team's offensive and defensive abilities. There will even be spectators and such that can
get in the way, so don't be surprised if you have to do a little extra swerving...or plowing over the inattentive
lolly-gaggers for that matter.
Thus far the game isn't looking too shabby. There's details a plenty, which is to be expected of software headed to a
next-gen console, but the character design is
looking pretty good too. How far this will encompass the final product is anyone's guess, but it's nice to see that Kodiak is going for some artistic flair, not just
photo-realism. And to accompany the nifty visuals, the game's audio will be in Dolby Surround too, something we're not seeing nearly enough of in this day and age.
When I first learned of this game images of Road Rash 3D flooded my memory, then came mild
trepidation, but looking at what Kodiak has in mind for Circus Maximus it looks like there could be quite a bit of fun to be had on the finished product. Here's to hoping it works out.
