Spartan focuses on one of the most influential Civilisations in the History of mankind – the Ancient Greeks, and allows players to choose from 100 nations to lead to victory, including Sparta, renowned for its total dedication to the art of war and that produced the ultimate fighting machine of the ancient world – the Spartan Hoplite; probably most famous for the courageous last stand of 300 Spartans at the Battle of Thermopylae in 480BC

Spartan contains many improvements and enhancements over the previous two games and features:

• Over 100 historically researched nations, each with a varying number of settlements and cities
• Hundreds of buildings and city improvements, utilising 9 different resources such as Gold, Marble, Copper and Grain
• Heroic leaders to inspire soldiers and lead armies in the field.
• Philosophers and scientists able to research dozens of different technologies.
• Over 40 different troop types across 10 ethnic and cultural groups
• The option to fight interactive battles on a 3D map.
• Cities that can be besieged to weaken them before an assault and catapults that hurl Greek Fire at the armies as they attack
• A fully rendered and authentically accurate campaign map of ancient Greece around 400BC
• A new multiplayer option which incorporates an unique AAM (always active multiplayer) feature for two players over LAN or GameSpy®
• Spies and diplomats that can broker trade deals, non-aggression pacts, alliances and undertake covert operations.
• Naval movement, battles and amphibious invasions.
• Roman, Persian or barbarian invaders.
• A reactive stock market that allows players to trade resources.

Bob Malin Just Play's Brand Manager offered:

"We are, of course, delighted to be working with Slitherine Strategies on Spartan as it further enhances our reputation for championing the cause of turn-based games and our continued support of small, but highly talented development teams as demonstrated by the recent success of Laser Squad Nemesis and Korsun Pocket. We also aim to capitalise on the increased interest in Ancient Greece generated by the various movies scheduled for release in 2004 that are set in the period, such as Troy and Gates of Fires which recreates the battle of Thermopylae"

JD McNeil, Slitherine Strategies' Business Manager further stated:

"We were really flattered when Just Play approached us, they're a perfect fit. With their commitment to quality and authenticity and their knowledge of the PC market we are confident that all the ingredients are in place to deliver a great product for Strategy games fans"

Iain McNeil Lead Designer at Slitherine, who is a double World Champion at tabletop strategy games says:

"We're all games players ourselves and enjoy all strategy genres but we know through experience that the frenetic 'clickfest' of RTS is not to everyone's taste." Demographics seem to support this and suggest that many fans of the genre refuse to spend their 'hard earned' on the vast range of RTS games that are available much preferring to wait until the next really good TBS comes along. We think that Spartan might just be it, indeed, Worthplaying.com, described Spartan as: "Civilisation with a 3D battle engine...", which is precisely what we are trying to achieve."