The battlefields of the videogame world are littered with the battered corpses of games that tried to cash in on world history. For every Age of Empires or Empire Earth, there’s a Circus Maximus. Stepping up to this intimidating precedent of mediocrity, developer/publisher LucasArts has gone off and made their own historical epic, Gladius. A mixture of tactical fighting and RPG in ancient mythological times, Gladius offers the heft and backbone necessary to succeed—but at a cost that makes it not for just anyone. The GameCube port of Gladius is impressive in most arenas, and if you don’t have an Xbox, this version will be right up your alley.

It’s funny how such a small change can really make a noticeable difference. Gladius is a huge game, an epic game. The Xbox version impressed, and for the most part, the GameCube version keeps things in place—a major complaint against the same game for the PlayStation 2. Same skimpy loading times, which is very important, same graphical quality, same great soundtrack and same load of replay value. And yet, the gameplay is nearly perfectly mimicked with a single exception, and this exception tended to bug me. The swing meter during battles feels magnetically inclined to not deliver a strike in the ‘sweet zone’, the short area before the point where attack values bottom out, where attacks are worth almost twice a normal hit. Naturally, getting these ‘sweet zone’ attacks is very important to defeating even common enemies. Maybe it’s the GameCube’s mushier A Button that puts up the fight, but for whatever reason, I had a far lower number of good hits than I did on the Xbox version. Gladius on Microsoft’s system made the player actually feel like time was a bigger factor than pure luck; Gladius on the GameCube does not whole-heartedly convince this is the case. Still, since the rest of the game comes through just like the slightly-superior Xbox version, players sticking with the Nintendo system need not let this keep them awake—Gladius is still quite good.

In Esperanto fashion, Gladius takes its historical cues from Greco-Roman and Norse mythology, mixing the two and adding a few dashes of Harryhausen’s Clash of the Titans-style creature features for fun. Starting with the near destruction of the world, players can either choose Valens, the gladiator from Imperia which stands as the advanced option, or Ursula, a princess from Nordagh who finally gets to see the world for her own. Players will change to the other character’s story at the halfway mark anyway, as the plot between Valens and Ursula is intertwined, so all but the most confident soldiers will want to start with the easier Ursula campaign. After witches predict the daughter born to the King will herald the resurrection of the Dark God and complete man’s destruction, the Queen has a boy—disappointing the witches—but also a girl, who is hidden. Growing up with slightly older brother Urlan, the two kids set out to start their own gladiator school. Ursula is unaware of the dark prophecy hanging over her head, and the evil minions who watch her moves are stunned to see a shining beacon of light inside her, threatening their plans. Could it be that fate is not immune to the power of a proper spirit? Over in Imperia, Valens teams up with his friend Ludo in their quest to form a powerful gladiator school. Long ago, Imperia was at war with Nordagh, and the relations are still uneasy; peace only lasts because of the utter destruction caused by the Dark God, but these memories have begun to fade with time. Now that border skirmishes are starting back up, and tensions mount, will this handful of heroes have the skills necessary to save perhaps the entire world from total annihilation?

The answer is clearly yes, but Gladius has so much fun getting into the Gladiator epic mood that it’s tough to fault the game for an easily revealed plot. Characters trade grandiose speeches, battles rage and the dialog is well written. Gladius soars up and down, being sure to catch the little revelations and surprises so as to distract the gamer from the obvious conclusion to the game. Still, while Gladius may certainly count its storyline as an asset, gamers will not want to put up with this game like an RPG, because if you don’t dig the gameplay, the story isn’t good enough to hold the necessary interest.

Instead, Gladius shares more in common with something like Final Fantasy Tactics, a strategy-based battle engine placed within the close confines of an arena and decked out with stacks of options. The strategy is as thin or deep as you please, but Gladius is clearly slanted towards tweak buffs; as the battles get harder, you’re far less likely to win if you’ve been goofing around and skipping areas and battles. For one thing, the game doesn’t just focus on fighting in the arena. It’s best to think of the showdown between sides as the final step in a long period of preparation; first you have to hire your team, choosing only the finest warriors to accompany your storyline characters into battle, and then you need to find the right equipment, combos and placement formations in order to gain enough of an upper hand to assure victory. The obvious inclination for most gamers will be to grab a few guys and run into the fight, and this will work… for the first few arenas. But after an hour or two, Gladius makes you buckle down and pay attention. I normally condemn strategy guides as unnecessary tools for the weak, but unless you have loads of time to experiment (along with plenty of save/test/quit/load old game cycles), you might want one for this game.

In the actual battles, much is randomized, and your performance can often depend solely on your skill clicking buttons instead of planning moves. Choosing who to attack with what is certainly most of the battle, but execution plays a key role, so don’t choke! Gladius utilizes an attack system that eerily resembles a golf game’s swing meter. You have a long orange bar, this is your normal attack range for the average damage, and then a small red zone. If you can click the A Button just right to land your attack within the red, you’ll do a bigger amount of damage, but you must be careful—the red zone is slim, and right beyond it is a trap. Hit the area after the higher damage zone, and you’ll ‘slip’ your attack and do extremely minimal damage. In later battles against powerful foes, this slip might mean your imminent death. Of course, this doesn’t stop gamers from going for the higher damage every time, but you just have to be careful to play slightly conservative to avoid troubles that come from a late attack. Again, this is why the oddly timed attack bar is so obnoxious.

The intricacies of the battle engine are too involved to get in depth here, but needless to say, there are many layers of Gladius to dissect. An Affinity system allows you to choose attacks and weapons that are aligned with a certain god, and these gods interact with other in a way that resembles rock-paper-scissors. The same medium beats light, heavy beats medium, light beats heavy system can be seen in the character classes. Hundreds of characters are available throughout Gladius, but they all fall into basic categories of light (support), medium and heavy. Some fighters aren’t human at all, but instead raging grizzly bears or angry cats. Don’t ask why. After fighting, characters who survive and were involved in the fight get experience points. Eventually, these points lead to increased levels, and the Job Points that come with that. Job Points are used to purchase new skills, forms and Affinity systems. Not much is new there.

As you explore the ancient lands of Gladius, you will travel town to town fighting in the arenas, choosing either Leagues or Tournaments. Gamers used to completing an area before moving on will be disturbed to know that this is actually discouraged in Gladius; not only will you often have to move on to another arena in order to get necessary qualifications and badges, but some fights aren’t even encouraged! Either the entry cost outweighs the prize, or something else… but not everything in the game is meant to be done, and Gladius is certainly not linear. While the storyline goes straight ahead, the action you participate in is entirely up to you. This might be the scariest proposition of all, and the reason Gladius is either for you or not: Instead of showing you the fun, the game merely provides all the avenues and structure necessary for you to create your own. The possibilities are vast, but players used to the strict confines of a linear RPG will be scared. It’s a lot of fun once you dive right in, so I suggest getting your feet wet.

Not much impresses visually, since Gladius is restricted to small arenas. FMVs and real-time cutscenes manage to greatly impress, especially with an increased amount of detail to facial animations. This is something you’ll actually notice, although the sparse environments in the background are probably the sacrifice necessary to get such results. Each ‘area’ has its own arena look, and while this tileset can get tiring if you’re stuck in any location too long, Gladius does a good job mixing things up. Animations are fun and occasionally exciting, with some summons and attack animations looking particularly cool. Gladius as a whole is visually solid, if not at all revolutionary; the GameCube handles things just fine, with crisp edges and proper detail intact.

On the other hand, the soundtrack takes no middle road. From start to finish, this is a great selection of amazing classic tunes. I used to think LucasArts only did good audio when they had John William’s bombastic Star Wars tracks to back them up, but Gladius features a soundtrack as rich in scope and texture as a professionally released album. If they released this on CD, I’d buy it, but since it’s not currently available separate, you’ll just need to be satisfied listening to the great tracks while playing the game. Occasionally campy and definitely fun voice work backs up Gladius, reinforcing the feeling of epic struggle in ancient Greco-Roman times. The soundtrack also gets piped over a very active Dolby Pro Logic II Surround channel for extra pleasure.

Unfortunately, Gladius does not cater well to a rental at all. It’s either 0 or 100%, with no medium ground whatsoever. This is because enjoying the game is a long-term affair, not some “pick up and roll” experience like Viewtiful Joe. A rental with these conditions would only be frustrating, and you’d just begin to get hooked by the time the game was due back, so if you’re going to experiment with Gladius, just go all out and pick the title up. With two different quests (Valens and Ursula feature different FMVs and slightly different difficulty levels) and much that is randomized each time through, Gladius provides the hours of replay necessary to back the game’s credibility up. Just completing all the leagues and tournaments, becoming the best gladiator school and getting all the badges will take numerous hours of your time, and that doesn’t even tie in with the epic storyline.

There’s a very unique situation going on with Gladius. On one hand, strategy and tactical RPG fans will absolutely adore the game, and need no convincing to go purchase this right away. On the other hand, the complexity and depth of the fighting is no doubt going to push people away. And these people will have no way to know if they like the game other then to rent, but Gladius really shouldn’t be rented. Perhaps purchase the game and take it to eBay if it doesn’t work out (or simply return it). Whatever you decide to do, make sure you at least give Gladius a trial spin. Maybe renting it and playing it for many hours will help you see if you like the game’s style. Don’t worry that you’re going to shorten the game’s longevity by going so in-depth with the rental, because Gladius is incredibly deep—an epic as grand in the gameplay’s scope as in the storyline’s. On a system known for the shallow depth of available RPGs, Gladius ought to make GameCube owners quite happy.