Anno 117: Pax Romana's Hidden Gem Turns Out to Be a Stunning First-Person View.
Surprisingly — did you realize it's possible to experience Anno 117 Pax Romana using a first-person camera? If that’s your reaction, you’re just as shocked compared to my initial response when I discovered this hidden feature. Allow me to briefly leave my empire’s management, entrust it to a trusted assistant, take a wagon, and go for a joyride around the classical city.
Activating the First-Person View
In its role as a city-builder, Anno 117: Pax Romana usually operates using a top-down camera. Yet, when you enter a secret combination — including “Ctrl,” “Shift,” and “R” on keyboard or else “Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B/Circle, A/X” on a controller — you gain the ability to walk the empire as an ordinary Roman. Because an analogous secret was part of Anno 1800, I felt excited to test it in the latest installment, though I was uncertain it would operate until I found myself stuck in a Celtic building (possibly an unexpected bug — this option tends to be a little buggy at times).
Discovering the Roman Cityscape
Once I crawled out, I walked the lively avenues across my settlement and explored shops, taverns, floral patches, and cockle pickers — it was glorious to see all my hard work from a brand-new perspective. I noticed a variety of intricacies I might have missed from the top-down view: Front door decorations, an ass transporting a floral pail, chickens running loose, folks chilling on their balconies… Simply noticing the shape of a window sill and the coloration on a post proves fascinating for those not residing in classical times.
More Than Just Walking
Yet, the experience extends to Anno 117’s first-person mode beyond simply walking the paths. I felt particularly pleased when I found out that besides being able to look upon crop lands, but also access them. And despite my expectation structures would be inaccessible, I was able to enter mud extraction sites, investigate a respected schoolhouse as teaching was underway, and even trespass into people’s gardens. Don’t try to open any doors (not even the studio have the budget for that), yet it's completely feasible meander across a cereal plantation, observe people digging and transporting bags, and glance into any tiny hut when there's no doorway obstructing.
Visual Quality and Atmosphere
Even though I expected to observe my settlement depicted using primitive rendering, excluding a few unpolished motions and sometimes citizens positioned in a bench rather than on a bench, first-person mode looks considerably improved over predictions. The meticulously crafted materials (particularly rock faces) shouldn't logically be this impressive for a title that remains primarily overhead. You might not observe separate follicular elements, yet you will notice engravings on walls, fiery particles from lamps, discoloration of masonry, pupils, and evergreen foliage. Evening, with glowing light sources and stars shining in the distance, generates a uniquely immersive environment, and proves significantly less intimidating versus the earlier title, now that the citizens don’t look like terrifying apparitions anymore.
Testing and Personalization
Since Anno 117’s super-secret first-person mode doesn’t come with an instruction manual, I chose to test various actions, and immediately located the options to jump, sprint, and changing perspective — with the latter allowing me to alternate between immersive and external perspectives and revert. I subsequently tried pressing certain numeric keys and found I could alter my character’s appearance. Amber garment? Ruby clothing? Sapphire and amethyst dress? Or — perhaps even better — full armor? You might hold a weapon and defense, or, personally chosen, equip a shooter's costume; when you press the action key, you launch incendiary bolts heavenward. If you're interested, eliminating citizens cannot be done (not that I’ve tried, of course).
Comedy and Population Encounters
Yet, I didn't want to damage my population, as they're remarkably entertaining. Shortly after I activated the immersive perspective, I listened to a dad instructing his kid that he “Can’t have a pet fox and if you feed it one more chicken, your elder will punish you.” Understandable stance, father character. A friendly native Celtic person then proceeded to praise my outstanding integration methods by labeling it “Perfect fusion,” while some cranky old lady opted to menace me: “Repeat that statement, and your disappearance will be permanent.”
The Thrill of Transportation
Just as I assumed I uncovered all possible content in Anno 117: Pax Romana’s first-person mode, I encountered the delight of riding across historical settings. Entirely by accident, I interacted with a cart and immediately found myself in the driver's position. Cattle, asses, even people-powered transports; you may operate any of them freely. The ass-drawn vehicle, specifically, is pretty fast, though you shouldn’t imagine any GTA-like shenanigans — you can’t drive into people or other wagons (reiterating, without confirming testing).
Combat Limitations
The single feature that frustrated me in Anno 117’s first-person mode was finding out I couldn’t partake in combat situations. Sporting my soldier fit, I ran up to the enemy in the midst of battle and attempted to attack them, only to be ignored completely. The proximate observation was nonetheless magnificent, and watching the enemy run, their limbs waving wildly, felt highly gratifying, though it might have been amazing to successfully impact objects via my incendiary bolts.
