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Wait — did you know you can play Anno 117: Pax Romana in first-person? If that’s your reaction, your surprise matches compared to my initial response when I discovered this concealed mode. Excuse me while temporarily abandon my empire’s management, entrust it to a trusted assistant, take a wagon, and enjoy a ride through Ancient Rome.

Activating the First-Person View

As a city-building game, Anno 117 Pax Romana is normally experienced from a bird's-eye view. However, if you input a hidden code — including “Ctrl,” “Shift,” and “R” on keyboard or else “Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B/Circle, A/X” with a gamepad — it becomes possible to roam the empire as an ordinary Roman. Because an analogous secret was part of the earlier game Anno 1800, I was eager to try it out in the latest installment, though I was uncertain it would operate before I discovered myself stuck in a Celtic building (which probably wasn’t intended — this mode tends to be prone to glitches now and then).

Roaming the Ancient Streets

After extracting myself, I wandered the bustling streets through my metropolis and toured stalls, alehouses, flower fields, and shellfish gatherers — it was glorious to observe the fruits of my labor from a brand-new perspective. I observed all kinds of details I might have missed from above: Entryway ornaments, a donkey carrying a flower bucket, chickens running loose, citizens lounging on their terraces… Merely examining the design of a windowsill and the coloration on a post is quite interesting to someone who doesn’t live in Ancient Rome.

Further Than Mere Wandering

However, there's additional content to Anno 117’s first-person mode than strolling along the road. I was especially delighted when I found out that I could not just observe farming fields, but also enter them. And even though I thought structures would be inaccessible, I managed to access clay pits, tour an esteemed educational structure while lessons were in session, and invade personal courtyards. Don't bother with door access (not even the developers planned for that functionality), however, you can definitely wander through a grain field, watch folks shoveling and carrying sacks, and take a peek inside any small shack as long as the door is absent.

Graphics and Ambiance

Although I was fully prepared to observe my settlement depicted with outdated visual quality, excluding a few unpolished motions and sometimes citizens positioned inside seating as opposed to atop a bench, the immersive perspective seems considerably improved over predictions. The meticulously crafted materials (particularly rock faces) are unexpectedly excellent for a title that remains primarily overhead. You might not observe separate follicular elements, yet you will notice wall inscriptions, fiery particles from lamps, fading on bricks, eye details, and pine tree leaves. Nighttime, with its flickering fires and stars shining in the distance, creates a particularly moody setting, and also a lot less scary compared to Anno 1800, especially since the inhabitants no longer resemble nightmarish entities now.

Experimentation and Customization

Given the covert first-person feature has no guided tutorial, I chose to test various actions, and immediately located the functions for jumping, dashing, and zoom in or out — the last option enabling me to switch between first and third-person views and return. I then experimented with certain numeric keys and discovered that I could change my avatar's look. Golden robe? Crimson attire? Blue and purple toga? Or — perhaps even better — full armor? You can wield a blade and protection, or, personally chosen, equip a shooter's costume; when you press the action key, you’ll fire burning arrows into the sky. In case you’re wondering, it’s not possible to kill civilians (though I didn't test this, obviously).

Humor and Citizen Interactions

Yet, I didn't want to damage my population, since they're incredibly amusing. Shortly after I activated the immersive perspective, I heard a parent advising their offspring that he “Can’t have a pet fox and if you offer additional fowl, your gran will have your head.” Understandable stance, father character. A pleasant regional Celt then proceeded to praise my outstanding integration methods by labeling it “Perfect fusion,” while some cranky old lady decided to threaten me: “Say that one more time, and they’ll never find your body.”

The Fun of Vehicle Use

At the moment I believed I’d discovered all there is to discover in the title's first-person feature, I found the joys of joyriding across historical settings. Totally unintentionally, I clicked on a wagon and immediately found myself in the driver's position. Cattle, asses, even human-pulled carts; you can drive them all at your leisure. The donkey-powered transport, notably, moves quite quickly, although you shouldn't expect open-world vehicular chaos — colliding with pedestrians or other carts is impossible (again, not saying I’ve tried).

Combat Limitations

The single feature that frustrated me in Anno 117’s first-person mode was learning about my exclusion from in any fighting. Equipped in warrior attire, I ran up to the enemy amidst fighting and attempted to attack them, but was entirely disregarded. The close-up view remained quite impressive, and observing foes flee, their arms flailing about, seemed enormously rewarding, yet it would have been exciting to actually hit something via my incendiary bolts.

{Conclusion: More to Discover|Final Thoughts: Additional Exploration