by Jillian Ryan - January 19, 2006

Legion Arena is a strategy based war game dated in the period of the Roman Republic. You get to choose whether to play as the Romans or take the opposing path of the Celts as you carve your way into history through many epic battles that formed either faction. You decide who will prevail in epic battles fighting for the glory of your people.

Choosing Your Path

As the Romans you begin as a villager who lives in a town opposing Rome, yet are eventually defeated and are forced to join the great Roman army. You destroy anything that opposes the might of Rome with battles against Gaul and Carthage while also putting down multiple uprisings by farmers and peasants. If you choose to be from the Celtic Clan then you’re completely opposed to the Roman Empire and must fight to free yourself from Rome’s grasp by launching raids against their army.

If you choose to be from the Celtic Clan then you’re completely opposed to the Roman Empire and must fight to free yourself from Rome’s grasp by launching raids against their army.

There are actually three parts of the story that you can choose to play. The first part of the story is actually an extremely helpful tutorial that demonstrates how Legion Arena works and how to get the best out of your army. From there you get to choose Romans or Celts and believe me after you choose your path you’re in it for the long haul… there are over 100 battles per scenario!

The battle system is very simply put… point and click. Sadly this is all I did the entire time I played the game, and in turn the game became boring and repetitive. There really was nothing but battles throughout the entire game. I was possibly hoping for a side story or at least something more than fight after fight. Many of the battles are over in less than ten minutes and they all appear to simply run together after a short amount of time due to how easy the battles are When a battle is lost you are brought back to before the battle where you can analyze what may have gone wrong and fix your troops or upgrade their equipment. The big let down in the battles is how difficult it is to actually control your troops. It’s hard to tell one troop from another when they all mash together on the battleground and your commander has a very limited amount of commands that he can give out. There is also a timer that has to slowly build up before you can command your troops again.

Throwback to 1995

Looking at the box one would think that the graphics are incredibly detailed and that the environments would be lush. Yet once I began playing the game I slowly began to realize that the graphics were a bit under par. The variations between character models were extremely limited. There were only three or four faces throughout the entire game, randomly placed on the character. The faces themselves appeared flat and without expression. Clothing movements were choppy and there was very limited variation. Only a few clothing types and colors were available to choose from, making the characters seem to run together in battle.

Unfortunately there isn’t enough variation in the battlefield terrain. There are sparse random hills and trees almost making a real terrain and a few instances in which your armies can battle in the rain. Yet the neat part about the terrain in the game is that it does affect how your armies work. For example, rain slows your party down and a rocky mountain terrain is bad for your cavalry to run on.

Crisp and Clean

I was very pleased with the sound quality of Legion Arena. A long narration in the beginning explaining the story of the game is flawlessly done and really drew me in. Even though the musical score in battle is limited to maybe three or four tracks, it is well done and pleasant to listen to while sorting through your troops. The sound effects were decently realistic from the battle cries to the clashing of swords.

Click and Repeat

Skills, equipment, fame, all part of what makes Legion Arena a true strategy based battle game with just a taste of RPG elements. The fact that the game is historically accurate gives you the feeling of what battles may have been like back in the time of the Romans. There is a two player mode in the game that adds a bit of spice to the game once you beat both the Roman and Celtic paths. You can choose which battlefield to play on and how much money the players start with. It’s a great way to break away from the single player mode of Legion Arena. I beat the Roman path in a very short amount of time and everything just seemed to fly by due to lack of substance and interest. The replay value of Legion Arena is surprisingly low unfortunately.

Customize Me Baby!

A savior for the game is the fact that you can customize and recruit new troops between the battles. The customizing section is very user friendly and is where I felt that a person really did have to begin using strategy. If you build up your characters properly and with some thought you’ll always have the upper hand in upcoming battles.

You can also add troops and units in which you can command including special anti-cavalry units! With each battle you gain more experience points which you then use to buff up your army to make yourself almost invincible. If in some case your troops do die you can replace them by using something called "fame points". Fame points are acquired at the end of each battle and the game gives you an extremely large amount each time so there is really no fear of running out.

Strategy in the Works

Legion Arena does accomplish the goal of a strategy based war game and I did enjoy playing it. Unfortunately even though it came through for its genre, it was lacking in depth and was too much of the same thing again and again. The game left with a feeling of very little accomplishment due to the limited amount of substance that actually made up the game.

Slitherine did do a good job with the making of Legion Arena, and there is an add-on planned for February of 2006 that will add several new features including new graphical effects, new battles, new special equipment and more.