Circus Maximus: Chariot Wars

"Not bad, but not great"

This game was one of the first games on X-BOX and it was the birth of a whole new kind of racing/battling

Game play-
The racing is fun with a career, co-op, and a single player mode. The single player is very challenging, you get to drive the chariot and when you get near a challenger, with the click of a button, you become the fighter. This is exciting and the battling is not really intense but it's challenging, you get a variety of attacks, double, lounge/stab, just a plain strike, and then your "special". The co-op is the greater aspect of the game, one of the players gets to drive the chariot while the other fights the other chariots. The career mode lets you go through a series of races and allows you to unlock more tracks and other valuable objects. All of the Chariots, drivers, fighters, and horses can be custom selected, they all have a unique handling, crowd enhancement, weapons/ attacks, and speed/stamina. So your team selection is up to you. The only problem that I found is that the single player becomes old after a while, but the co-op, for me, has never lost its charm. There is a variety of levels and environments from stadiums to the sea-shore, they were all pretty well layed out. The gore level was not that bad, well if you like gore then it is, there is not much blood, so it's a pretty clean game.

Graphics-
The graphics were not exceptional but they were average for X-BOX. The environment was not the best graphics or detail, but the drivers graphics was all that I really cared about.

Sound-
Well there is not much to say here, there really was no custom soundtrack. The sound effects for the chariots was pretty good, and didn't leave much to complain about.

Overall-
The game was a pretty fun, battle/racing title, but if you have no one to play it with (since it is not X-BOX Live compatible) then I suggest renting it, or in my case buying it used for a descent price.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 10/18/05