Friends, Romans, Countrymen! Lend me your Speccy! I've
come to tell you the story of Rome, and how it became the ruler of
the world and then went into a decline. Your job as Biggus
Bossius
(Biggus what? Ed) is to last as long as you can in the
face of marauding Gauls, Goths, Vandals, Carthaginians and 33
other battling barbarians, as well as the odd cynical senator intent
on Civil War.
The game starts in 273BC and lasts as long as you do. There's
an average of four turns to every century, so don't be surprised if
your games comes to an abrupt end - a lot can happen in 25
years you know! You get a 16 page booklet which is supposed to
help you, though the amount of help it gives is debatable, and it's
not the clearest thing I've ever clapped eyes on.
The game, unfortunately, is programmed in that most ancient of
languages, Slowius Basicus, which means that it takes an age to
play and crashes regularly. It's got a very messy screen display,
and frankly, I found it fairly incomprehensible and terribly
confusing. There's a moral note at the end of the booklet where it
says that the most important lesson learned by the author is the
ultimate futility of Imperialism. Well, that may be so, but I'd have
thought the ultimate lesson to be learnt is how to make a game of
this type interesting and fun!
Definitely one for those who're
completely obsessed by war
games!
| Ratings given by other magazines |
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| Info supplied by the SPOT*ON database |
