Anno 117: Pax Romana's Top Secret Turns Out to Be a Impressive First-Person Mode.
Wait — did you know it's possible to experience Anno 117 Pax Romana using a first-person camera? If that’s your reaction, you feel equally astonished compared to my initial response when I discovered this secret option. I must temporarily abandon my empire’s management, delegate it to a reliable subordinate, commandere a carriage, and take a spin across the Roman world.
Activating the First-Person Feature
In its role as a city-builder, Anno 117 Pax Romana is normally experienced using a top-down camera. Yet, when you press a covert button sequence — including “Ctrl,” “Shift,” and “R” using PC controls alternatively “Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B/Circle, A/X” on a controller — you can explore the realm as a regular inhabitant. Since a similar easter egg appeared in Anno 1800, I looked forward to test it in Ubisoft's newest game, yet I had doubts it would work until I found myself stuck in a Celtic building (likely not meant to happen — this feature tends to be somewhat unstable occasionally).
Exploring the Ancient Streets
Once I crawled out, I strolled the lively avenues of my city and visited shops, taverns, flower fields, and shellfish gatherers — the experience was splendid to see all my hard work through a fresh lens. I noticed a variety of intricacies I wouldn’t have spotted when viewing from overhead: Entryway ornaments, a beast of burden holding a blossom container, fowl roaming freely, citizens lounging on their terraces… Even just observing the form of a ledge and the coloration on a post is quite interesting to modern individuals unfamiliar with ancient life.
More Than Just Walking
However, there's additional content to the game's immersive perspective than strolling along the road. I felt particularly pleased the moment I learned that besides being able to view crop lands, but also access them. And despite my expectation structures would be inaccessible, I managed to access mud extraction sites, investigate a respected schoolhouse during active classes, and intrude into private gardens. Avoid attempting to open doors (not even the developers allocated resources for that), yet it's completely feasible stroll around a barley farm, observe people digging and transporting bags, and take a peek inside any small shack as long as the door is absent.
Appearance and Mood
While I was completely ready to see my metropolis represented in PlayStation 1 graphics, excluding a few unpolished motions and periodic inhabitants sitting within a bench instead of on a bench, first-person mode looks much better than expected. The intricately designed surfaces (notably masonry elements) really have no business being this good in what is still, essentially, a top-down game. You won't necessarily notice specific hair details, however, you can observe engravings on walls, sparks flying from torches, brick decoloration, pupils, and conifer needles. Evening, with glowing light sources and stars shining in the distance, generates a uniquely immersive environment, and feels much less frightening compared to Anno 1800, especially since the inhabitants no longer resemble terrifying apparitions anymore.
Experimentation and Customization
Because the game's hidden immersive perspective has no guided tutorial, 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 change from first-person to third-person mode and return. I then decided to hit certain numeric keys and learned I could modify my representative's visual design. Amber garment? Red toga? Blue and purple toga? Or — maybe superior — complete battle gear? You can wield a blade and protection, or, my favorite, don a marksman outfit; if you activate the engage command, you launch incendiary bolts heavenward. If you're interested, it’s not possible to kill civilians (though I didn't test this, obviously).
Amusement and Inhabitant Dialogues
However, I had no desire to injure my people, since they're incredibly amusing. Only seconds after I landed the immersive perspective, I listened to a dad instructing his kid that “Owning a fox is prohibited and if you feed it one more chicken, your gran will have your head.” Appropriate response, paternal figure. A friendly native Celtic person then began complimenting my excellent cross-cultural strategies by describing it as “Ideal combination,” meanwhile a grumpy senior female opted to menace me: “Say that one more time, and they’ll never find your body.”
The Fun of Vehicle Use
Just when I thought I had found everything available in Anno 117: Pax Romana’s first-person mode, I found the joys of joyriding in Ancient Rome. Completely unexpectedly, I interacted with a cart and quickly occupied the transport. Bovines, equines, even manually drawn vehicles; you can control each one as desired. The donkey-powered transport, notably, is pretty fast, but don't anticipate Grand Theft Auto-style mischief — colliding with pedestrians or other carts is impossible (reiterating, without confirming testing).
Fighting Restrictions
The single feature that frustrated me in Anno 117’s first-person mode was discovering my inability to participate in any fighting. Wearing my military outfit, I approached opposing forces during active combat and attempted to attack them, only to be ignored completely. The front-row seat was still rather spectacular, and watching the enemy run, their arms flailing about, proved very satisfying, yet it would have been exciting to successfully impact objects with my burning arrows.