I am a huge history buff…especially Roman and Greek history. This probably comes from the fact that my mother is a high school Latin teacher (this is her 40th year teaching by the way). As such, I have always been enthralled by the Spartans. Those kind of warriors just don’t exist today…and probably for good reason. However, the whole concept of a warrior from birth taps straight into the hero complex that I have.

So any form of media that has to do with Greek/Roman mythology, Spartans, gladiatorial combat, etc and you can usually count me in as a customer (as you might have guessed 300 and Gladiator are some of my favorite movies). So when I see a game called Hero of Sparta (by Gameloft, $6.99 on App Catalog) I pretty much have to get it.

So I got it, what do I think of it? It’s frustrating fun…

There are a lot of games now that utilize a touch based D pad to let you control your character. This was the first one I have played and, I have to say, I wasn’t all that impressed. I don’t know if it is the nature of the touchscreen or what, but I had a difficult time moving just the way I wanted to move. Sometimes I would move my thumb too far…sometimes it didn’t seem to register my touch…overall the experience leaves a bit to be desired.

Is the game unplayable? No, not at all…just not as responsive as I would like.

The game itself is actually pretty well done. You take the role of a “Super Spartan” that would make Ah-nold blush. Seriously, this guy is a beast. Not a lot of story here…just enough to send you off to kill hundreds of beasties based on Greek Mythology. Minotaurs, weird crabby things, lizard people, and scorpions all wait for you to smite them.

To do the smiting you tap on one of two virtual buttons. Your sword button can be held down some to get some combo action, and as you collect super items (like the Sword of Damocles, or Axe of Ajax!!) you unlock board sweeping skills that take up your magic.

Aside from the regular baddies, you also run into mini-bosses all over the place. These add a bit of variety in that you get little quick-time-events that make it so you have to click the screen in a certain place a few times to kill them off. It is a nice mechanic overall, but I feel it is overused. Once you get on in the later levels you can have 3 mini-bosses against you at one time. Also, the pattern you have to touch doesn’t change except between monster types, so if you have to kill 3 minotaurs, you will do the same tapping 3 times.

The boss battles feel nice and epic. Most of them are hugemongous and have some form of trick to beat them (often another QTE). This isn’t anything you haven’t seen before, but they are fun nonetheless.

Graphics wise I am gonna give it a meh. Most of the textures are blocky…looks like something on the old PS1 perhaps. However, I did dig the animation. Mr. Spartan may look a bit pixelly, but he moves nicely and transitions between attacks well. Good job Mr. (or Ms.) Animatordude (or dudette)!!

Level design is also nicely done…lots of variety and a surprising amount of verticalness. The one downside to the levels are the traps. The control issues make these much more difficult than they should be.

The game will last you a good few hours if you are digging it. I, for one, plan on seeing it through to the end. I want to see if the Axe of Ajax will speed up my httpxmlrequest objects (a little web developer humor for ya).