Anno 117: Pax Romana's Top Secret Is a Stunning First-Person Perspective.
Surprisingly — did you realize you can play Anno 117: Pax Romana using a first-person camera? Should that be your response, you feel equally astonished as I was upon finding out this secret option. I must briefly leave overseeing my civilization, leave it in a trusted assistant, take a wagon, and go for a joyride around the classical city.
How to Access the First-Person View
Being a city-building title, Anno 117 Pax Romana is normally experienced from a bird's-eye view. Yet, when you press a covert button sequence — such as “Ctrl,” “Shift,” and “R” using PC controls or “Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B/Circle, A/X” on a controller — you can explore your domain as a common citizen. Given a comparable hidden feature was included in the earlier game Anno 1800, I was eager to try it out in Ubisoft's newest game, yet I had doubts it would function before I discovered myself chin-deep in a Celtic floorboard (likely not meant to happen — this mode tends to be somewhat unstable occasionally).
Discovering the Roman Cityscape
Upon freeing myself, I wandered the bustling streets across my settlement and visited stalls, alehouses, flower fields, and cockle pickers — it felt magnificent to see all my hard work using an entirely new viewpoint. I observed a variety of intricacies I wouldn’t have spotted from above: Doorway embellishments, a beast of burden holding a blossom container, poultry scattering about, citizens lounging on their terraces… Merely examining the form of a ledge and the paint layers on a column proves fascinating to someone who doesn’t live in Ancient Rome.
Beyond Simple Strolling
However, there's additional content to the game's immersive perspective beyond simply walking the paths. I was especially delighted the moment I learned that besides being able to observe farming fields, but also step into them. And although I’d assumed the building models would be off-limits, I could walk onto clay pits, investigate a respected schoolhouse as teaching was underway, and intrude into private gardens. Don’t try to open any doors (not even the developers have the budget for that), but it’s entirely possible wander through a grain field, watch folks shoveling and carrying sacks, and look within any modest shelter when there's no doorway obstructing.
Graphics and Ambiance
Even though I expected to witness my city rendered with outdated visual quality, besides some crude animations and the occasional civilian resting in a bench rather than on a bench, the first-person view appears much better than expected. The intricately designed surfaces (particularly rock faces) are unexpectedly excellent for a title that remains primarily overhead. You won't necessarily notice any individual strands of hair, but you will see engravings on walls, fiery particles from lamps, fading on bricks, iris elements, and evergreen foliage. Evening, with glowing light sources and stars shining in the distance, is especially atmospheric, and proves significantly less intimidating compared to Anno 1800, especially since the inhabitants no longer resemble sleep paralysis demons anymore.
Testing and Personalization
Given the covert first-person feature doesn’t come with an instruction manual, I decided to experiment a bit, and quickly discovered the functions for jumping, dashing, and zoom in or out — with the latter allowing me to alternate between immersive and external perspectives and return. I then decided to hit various digit inputs and discovered that I could change my avatar's look. Golden robe? Crimson attire? Sapphire and amethyst dress? Or — perhaps even better — full armor? You might hold a weapon and defense, or, my favorite, don a marksman outfit; if you hit the interaction button, you shoot flaming projectiles upward. In case you’re wondering, it’s not possible to kill civilians (not that I attempted, naturally).
Comedy and Population Encounters
But I wouldn’t wish to harm my citizens anyway, since they're incredibly amusing. Only seconds after I landed the immersive perspective, I listened to a dad instructing his kid that “You cannot keep a fox as a pet and if you feed it one more chicken, your elder will punish you.” Appropriate response, paternal figure. A friendly native Celtic person then began complimenting my brilliant Romano-Celtic policies by describing it as “Ideal combination,” meanwhile a grumpy senior female decided to threaten me: “Say that one more time, and they’ll never find your body.”
The Thrill of Transportation
At the moment I believed I uncovered all possible content in Anno 117: Pax Romana’s first-person mode, I experienced the pleasure of driving in Ancient Rome. Totally unintentionally, I selected a carriage and quickly occupied the transport. Bovines, equines, even human-pulled carts; you can drive them all at your leisure. The ass-drawn vehicle, specifically, is pretty fast, but don't anticipate any GTA-like shenanigans — colliding with pedestrians or other carts is impossible (reiterating, without confirming testing).
Battle Constraints
The sole aspect that let me down regarding the first-person view was discovering my inability to participate in combat situations. Equipped in warrior attire, I ran up to the enemy during active combat and endeavored to damage them, but was entirely disregarded. The close-up view was still rather spectacular, and watching the enemy run, their arms flailing about, felt highly gratifying, though it might have been amazing to actually hit something using my fiery projectiles.
