When I was a child and saw Ben Hur, I was dazzled by the chariot racing scene. Many years later, I learned that when that guy went under the horse and got killed, that actually happened, and that actor really died. Ever since, I have had a sort of morbid fascination with Roman chariot races. Something about the speed and violence, the almost complete lack of rules, combined with the beauty of the Roman arena, makes these deadly races desperately exciting.
When I received my copy of Ave Caesar, I was thrilled. Starting with the beautiful art on the box, this game promised to let me relive that exciting scene, to throw caution to the wind and fight tooth-and-nail in a battle where the only thing that matters is crossing the finish line first.
The board and game pieces only improve on this perception. The double-sided game board represents two beautiful tracks around which charioteers can hurl their fragile vehicles. The pieces, brightly-colored plastic renditions of chariot teams, are solid and well-crafted. The cards used to drive the chariot teams bear attractive art, completing the feeling of quality that you get when you open the box.
And then you read the rules.
In Ave Caesar, players place their tokens on the track and play numbered cards. Each numbered card moves your chariot forward the indicated number of spaces, and the track has several places where it is important to play the right card. For instance, there are inside and outside tracks, with the outside tracks containing more spaces. You may be able to pass an opponent with a high-valued card by taking the outside track, but you lose precious spaces doing it. There are also bottlenecks that allow only one chariot to pass at a time, and ending your turn in such a space can force your opponents to get stuck behind you.
One additional wrinkle is added to the game. Each race is three laps, and on the first or second lap, every player must ride past Caesar to offer tribute. If you finish the race without offering tribute, you are disqualified (and Caesar might just have you killed). Caesar's track slows down a chariot significantly, but each player must hit it at some point.
Playing the right cards can be vital, particularly because each player's deck contains barely enough cards to complete the race. If you waste your cards taking the outside track just to stay in the race, you may find yourself out of cards before you cross the finish line. In fact, this is not even hard to do. Out of three games we played, I ran out of cards twice. Once I am not even sure how I did it, because I thought I stayed pretty close to the inside track.
As you can see, the rules for Ave Caesar are very simple. That is not a necessarily a criticism – many excellent games have very simple rules. However, in the case of Ave Caesar, there just aren't enough rules to make it interesting. In fact, there are even rules that can make it more boring.
One questionable rule has to do with going fast. When a player is in the lead, he may not play a '6' movement card (the fastest in the game). So when you have the lead, you have to slow down. I may not know how Roman chariot races really worked, but I can tell you for sure that Ben Hur would never slow down when he was in the lead.
One thing notably absent from Ave Caesar is violence. Sure, you don't need violence to have a good game, but it just doesn't feel like Ben Hur if you can't whip the other chariot drivers or force opponents to crash. The game is beautiful – indisputably gorgeous – but the rules leave out all the most exciting parts of the gladiatorial chariot race. There is no sense of speed, and none of the aggression and testosterone that has made me love chariot races since I was old enough to know what they were.
The problem with Ave Caesar is not that it fails to recreate the impression of a Roman chariot race. As you look at the fantastic game board and pieces, you can almost hear the roar of the crowd. The production values are amazing, and the aesthetics of the game draw you into another time and place.
The problem is in the game itself. Specifically, Ave Caesar is not very much fun. It is not fast or exciting, and is instead potentially frustrating. It is a shame that a game with such powerful visuals fails to deliver. The rules are sound enough, but they're just not very much fun.
Style: 5 – Asmodee continues to create some of the most beautiful games on the market.
Substance: 2 – While the rules might work, more or less, the game is not much fun.
Review Summary