Participate in tournaments with your team of gladiators as you employ bribes and assassinations to weaken your enemies. Acquire gladiators from your competitors, or sell them if you lose interest. Train them with new skills and upgrade their stats to dominate the colosseum.

Gladiator Manager is a strategic management game with an auto-battler component. It operates on a turn-based system, where each turn is divided into two primary segments. The first segment focuses on actions such as leveling up your gladiators, managing your finances, building upkeep, tournament registration, gladiator acquisition, and opponent sabotage. The second segment is combat preparation and execution: picking equipment and setting up bribes.

The game progresses through various phases, starting from the initial setup (turns 1-50), moving into a more complex mid-game (turns 50-150), and offering late-game gameplay variation and additional content (after turn 150). Through an ascension system, you can do over 10 re-runs with mutators, and there are 3 difficulty settings to complete your games on.

To organise your gladiators effectively, you handle their injuries, and maintain their loyalty. Level up their attributes, select techniques, and choose fighting styles to optimise their performance in battle.

Overall, Gladiator Manager offers a management experience set against a historical backdrop, highlighting the importance of strategic decision-making and effective resource management to rise as the most dominant lanista in Rome.