Anno 117: Pax Romana's Top Secret Reveals Itself as a Stunning First-Person View.
Hold on — were you aware you can play Anno 117 Pax Romana from a first-person viewpoint? If that’s your reaction, you’re just as shocked as my own reaction when I discovered this hidden feature. I must temporarily abandon overseeing my civilization, delegate it to a capable deputy, commandere a carriage, and go for a joyride around the classical city.
Activating the First-Person Feature
Being a city-building title, Anno 117 Pax Romana is typically played from an overhead perspective. However, if you press a covert button sequence — for example “Ctrl,” “Shift,” and “R” on keyboard or else “Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B/Circle, A/X” on console — you gain the ability to walk the realm as a regular inhabitant. Because an analogous secret was included in the earlier game Anno 1800, I looked forward to test it in the latest installment, but I wasn’t sure it would operate before I discovered myself submerged in a structural glitch (likely not meant to happen — this mode tends to be somewhat unstable occasionally).
Exploring the Roman Cityscape
After extracting myself, I wandered the busy roads through my metropolis and toured stalls, alehouses, blossom gardens, and cockle pickers — it felt magnificent to observe my diligent efforts using an entirely new viewpoint. I detected all kinds of details I might have missed from above: Doorway embellishments, an ass transporting a floral pail, poultry scattering about, citizens lounging on their terraces… Even just observing the form of a ledge and the coloration on a post proves fascinating for those not residing in classical times.
Further Than Mere Wandering
But there’s more to the game's immersive perspective aside from meandering through streets. I became extraordinarily excited the moment I learned that not only could I view farming fields, but also access them. And although I’d assumed the building models would be off-limits, I managed to access clay pits, tour an esteemed educational structure while lessons were in session, and intrude into private gardens. Avoid attempting to open doors (not even the studio planned for that functionality), yet it's completely feasible stroll around a barley farm, observe people digging and transporting bags, and take a peek inside any small shack when there's no doorway obstructing.
Graphics and Ambiance
Even though I expected to see my metropolis represented using primitive rendering, besides some crude animations and sometimes citizens positioned in a bench instead of on a bench, the first-person view appears considerably improved over predictions. The highly detailed textures (notably masonry elements) are unexpectedly excellent in what is still, essentially, a top-down game. You may not see any individual strands of hair, yet you will notice writings on surfaces, fiery particles from lamps, discoloration of masonry, eye details, and evergreen foliage. Nighttime, with its flickering fires and celestial bodies twinkling afar, generates a uniquely immersive environment, and also a lot less scary compared to Anno 1800, given that the populace appears unlike sleep paralysis demons now.
Discovery and Modification
Since Anno 117’s super-secret first-person mode doesn’t come with an instruction manual, I decided to experiment a bit, and quickly discovered the options to jump, sprint, and zoom in or out — the zoom function permitting me to alternate between immersive and external perspectives and revert. I subsequently tried pressing various digit inputs and found I could alter my representative's visual design. Yellow toga? Ruby clothing? Sapphire and amethyst dress? Or — maybe superior — complete battle gear? You can wield a blade and protection, or, my favorite, don a marksman outfit; if you hit the interaction button, you shoot flaming projectiles upward. Should you be curious, harming inhabitants is impossible (not that I’ve tried, of course).
Humor and Citizen Interactions
However, I had no desire to injure my people, since they're incredibly amusing. Moments after I entered the first-person view, I listened to a dad instructing his kid that “Owning a fox is prohibited and if you offer additional fowl, your elder will punish you.” Appropriate response, paternal figure. A pleasant regional Celt then started applauding my excellent cross-cultural strategies by labeling it “Perfect fusion,” meanwhile a grumpy senior female decided to threaten me: “Utter those words again, and your fate will be sealed.”
The Joy of Joyriding
Just when I thought I had found everything available in Anno 117: Pax Romana’s first-person mode, I found the joys of joyriding across historical settings. Totally unintentionally, I interacted with a cart and was promptly seated on the box. Oxen, donkeys, even human-pulled carts; you may operate any of them freely. The donkey cart, in particular, travels rather rapidly, but don't anticipate any GTA-like shenanigans — colliding with pedestrians or other carts is impossible (reiterating, without confirming testing).
Fighting Restrictions
The single feature that frustrated me within the immersive perspective was learning about my exclusion from in combat situations. Sporting my soldier fit, I charged toward adversaries in the midst of battle and endeavored to damage them, yet was completely overlooked. The close-up view was still rather spectacular, and observing foes flee, their appendages thrashing around, proved very satisfying, yet it would have been exciting to effectively strike targets with my burning arrows.
