***MAJOR WARNING*** even though I gave this game a thumbs up. This game, at its best, is okay. Lots of potential, however short major yards from being a very positive (rating) game. A slightly confusing, kinda broken but still functioning, pretty decent game loop type of game. If you ever wanted to raise gladiators - I guess here is a game for you!

Ludus' gameplay is more or less of being a manager. Ensuring food stocks are in supply, making coins in different ways like marketing, fishing, and betting, building structures to better settlement development, providing equipment and training gladiators, and a few more. The player controls the character from a first person perspective and is given a little manor by a family member. It's up to the player to keep the settlement running and profitable. There are NPC family member characters that help run tasks, such as acquiring wood, acquiring iron, making money, and selling goods. One of the most tedious parts of this game is ensuring the family members do not die from lack of health or sickness. There is no update or engine in sight to automate this process, which means the player will have to manually always fill up their health and lower their sickness bar. This is where the game sort of starts sucking because it could've been so great.

Further into the gameplay is the gladiator portion of the game. As the player acquires coins more of the world becomes available. The player can buy a selection of slaves/gladiators and begin training and arming them as they please. Other NPCs such as blacksmiths can help craft weapons or armor rather than buying it, that's of course if the player hired the architect first to build a blacksmith. Other areas of interest include a barn (which is used to create goods for sale), dungeons (where gladiators go to retrieve items for the player's market), upgrades to training courses, doctors on sight for healing, a trade merchant for overseas, and a tournament director for single or tournament events. Other items of interest includes hiring bandits to steal, dice games, and other market items the player can purchase and use to build using the architect. The gladiator portion itself is not bad. The delay between the swings and damage and camera controls are brutal. It is fun raising gladiators and watching if they'll win fights. Generally, the stronger one will win, but there certainly can be surprises.

The visuals and graphics are basic looking unity assets. Not necessarily a bad thing as basic animations are included, including a poop on the ground feature thanks to the gladiators. The actions are all there and NPCs do look like they're keeping busy. They can get annoying trying to move through the tight spaces of the city as the player cannot go through them (and can sometimes get pushed by them). The world itself looks fine - again nothing too great or special. No special effects or major shaders, but there is a night and day cycle! The sounds and music are present - that's the best way I can put it. Everything that should be making noise, more or less, does. There is a "son" NPC in the game where he non-stop plays his annoying flute for money. That will most likely drive the player crazy after a few minutes (more incentive to go send him out to work).

Overall, this game is decent. That's it. Unfortunately it seems like the dev left this in the rear view mirror, which really sucks because this game seems like it has quite a bit of potential Would be nice if there was an ability to control the gladiators as well. I'll barely recommend this one, even on sale. If you have a couple of bucks hanging around and a few hours to figure out a game that barely has a tutorial (but can be figured out simply by exploring), this is for you. Another huge warning: if you do start making money and having items in certain slots (such as the wife selling goods, market has items, or gladiators return from dungeon) upon saving and exiting the game, then reloading those items are gone.