Topic: Impressions: Hero of Sparta

I must be like the only person in the world to get this game, I could not find a review anywhere, so I base my judgment on past gameloft games, and the awesome video they have made. I only played the first stage so far and a little of the second stage with that huge orge monster. This is the impression I got afterwards.

Graphics:

• For a DSI there pretty decent, I love it actually. Lots of details in the background. Models look great too.
• Framerate drops when a lot of characters are on the screen, BUT the game DOES NOT slow down making it playable when surrounded by multiple enemies. I can easily roll quickly after an attack if I see a huge attack coming my way.
• Not a lot of blood effects. Blood is missing from certain attacks especially with finishers that feel very lifeless, even though with the blood it was lifeless already with the other versions of this game, but sheesh, add a shake screen effect on the last hit would of been fine. Dammit these gameloft programmers.

Sound

• Sound effect are allright. Ambient noises with music are good as well.
• Missing soundtracks! The first boss I fought has no boss music, the stage music just keeps playing, this definitely narrows down that arcade feeling you get when you fight a boss. This game is only 96 blocks so there no excuse, they have more space, I think the limit is 120 blocks.

Controls

• Game controls fine, have no prob with the controls except it seems that button detection is way too sensitive or to fast when getting in battle scenes, (going into a system of button presses to achieve a hit, or getting out of a grab). For example when on the second stage, when that big ogre lays his hands on me there's a sequence of 3 buttons you'll have to press to stab him in his hand, if I'm doing a combo with another enemy I have to stop when he about to touch me or else the next button I push will be the wrong button 90% of the time. It definitely makes getting out of grabs a little hard.
• Contols feels fine when running around, 2-d parts and small areas might make you feel a little frustrated since your movement is limited to left or right or falling of ledges but you'll get use to it, which leads to that this game would not be anymore better or fun with an analog stick.

Content:

• There are 3 difficulty levels. I choose normal cause the last difficulty level needs to be unlocked.
• In the level selection screen I only see 4 more stages to choose from after beating the first one making 5 stages for the game (From what I played. Did the iphone version have 8? I don't really know. But I hope there is more stages than that. At least one more hidden one.
• The first boss is not the same as the other version. I think I know why, here is my theory: The first boss in the iphone version was a centaur. The first boss in the DS version is a boss that stand on 2 legs. I can pretty much guess that all bosses will be standing on two legs to save space and use the same 3-D skeleton for animation over and over again. But then again there could be other reasons.

Is this worth 800 points, I say yes compared to other games on the DSIware library. I don't compare my DSI games to consoles or other games. I bought this game cause I wanted some kind of hack and slash adventure game on my DSI, especially one that bites off god of war.

I say Hero of Sparta is a very decent game. Its definitely not worse than I thought it was when the only thing I could rely on for a impression was a post on here that said "do not buy hero of sparta". I bought it anyway praying to god that it didnt suck. Its a good game.

You probably couldn't find a review 'cuz it's only been out for about a day (4 if you count Europe). Unlike retail games where you can send a retail copy to major online/print video game publications in advance to get the word out, downloadable games often receive less attention than retail games due to smaller budget, less hype, etc. and don't distribute copies in advance to reviewing sources. Anyway, most of us haven't bought it yet because 1. Most of us hate Gameloft and 2. X-Scape came out yesterday, and most of us are occupied with that. Thanks for posting your impressions, and welcome to NintendoLIfe!

I still think this is a rip-off. I bought it on my iPhone for $0.99, and it has better graphics on that! The game itself is actually pretty fun and somewhat lengthy (for an iPhone game. Not a DS game). The on-screen controls take a bit of getting used to, but still, it shouldn't cost $8 for a port of a cell phone game on the DS that costs less than a dollar on its native platform.

Welcome, and thanks.

You can 100% blame Nintendo on that. They determine the final pricing for their digital games, which I think it flat out stupid because it limits true competition and actual value most of the time.

As for the graphics, sadly but obviously, the Iphone/Touch has a far superior screen resolution and graphics capabilities over the DS. So if you own a phone/Touch then you're eye's will have been spoiled and there's obviously no point in getting App store ports for DSiWare.

The trailer, for those wondering about the graphics:
[youtube:t6EwW3_MF1I]

@drexegar:
Welcome to Nintendo Life and thanks for that impression on Hero Of Sparta. I think your right about the other versions of this game having 8 levels. The max limit for a DSiware game is 20mbs (128blocks) just to let you know.

Honestly this game is way over priced for me to take a chance on. It seems like Earthworm Jim was a peace offering from Gameloft. This title, Oregon Trail and Earthworm Jim uses the same amount of blocks(90ish) but for some reason Earthworm Jim is 300 points less. That really sucks because I have Oregon Trail so I feel like if I get this title Gameloft will be getting me for some Np's. I think i will just wait on Zenonia to get my hack and slash fix.

Thanks for the greeting Birdman! Been a long time lurker, and I use my DSI a lot.

Yeah as I see now, I didn't know the game was 1.99 when it first came out, 500 points would have been nice at least. I guess
though since its through nintendo, 800 points (in terms of business) seems right compared to other games that don't have a lot of content (or "pizzaz") for that matter) that cost 500 or 200 points. But also. Making a port on a lower end system is definitely way more work than just porting to a system that can use the same graphics and programming.

Oh well, time to answer some surveys and get some Nintendo coins so I get something worth for all this download spending.

Well, you say really goo things about the game and the video looks truly great, for me the price is a little high, if it were 500 points I will buy it, but as it is 800 np idk, so my friend has it for ipod and he says that it is totally awesome, that he is waiting for hero of sparta 2 to come out cause he will get it, so I say, hey these game is coming to DSi ware, maybe I will geth it. So i say that that post of "DO NOT BUY HERO OF SPARTA" was a little too much, I like games like these, but cheapogamer4life is right, Zenonia is coming to the DSi ware too and it looks great too, hahaha, sadly in these moment I don't have the points to buy hero of sparta, anyways I will maybe buy these one, I need to play it from my friend's ipod before, cause I have played it on a cellphone and it wasn't good, but of course, it is different

Oh and Birdman, not everyone hates gameloft games, I actually find that some of them have the best graphics and find some of them pretty sweet too.

After downloading it my impressions are this: See my other thread.

But then, I dunno, I like good games. Not games that are bad, but forgiven because they're the only one of their kind on a console. Mabye you guys like bad knock-offs of God of War. In which case, I'm sure you'll love this.

Im considering it, im waiting for the review though.

For the DS the graphics are fine but lacking the polish of the iPone version. It plays very on the rails... you can jump but only when the game requires you to so its hard to kill yourself by jumping the wrong way, because of this its not really an exploration type game which was it is to a certain extent on the standard mobile version. I paid the 800 points for it and as DSi games go, I am happy enough with it, but like with a lot of Gameloft games, there is just something missing to make it a great game. Using the rating system here I would give it a 7/10.. Oh yes its just over £1 for the iPhone version £5 for the android £4 for the PSP and £3 for the standard mobile version.. by my calculations its £7 for the DSi version. Not a staggering amount for a game but why the dearest, Nintendo distribution overheads ?

It used to be $10 when it first came out on the App Store. Eeek.

GameLoft does that a lot on the App Store. They launch games at about $10, and after 4-5 days, lower them to $7. About a week after that, they go down to $5, and the next week are at $2. The next week they have a "limited time sale", and permanently lower it to $0.99, but always keep the notice that it is a sale in the description to make you feel like you will miss out if you don't buy now.