Anno 117 Pax Romana's Top Secret Is a Stunning First-Person Perspective.
Hold on — were you aware it's possible to experience the game Anno 117 using a first-person camera? If you're thinking that, you’re just as shocked as my own reaction when I discovered this secret option. I must briefly leave my empire’s management, entrust it to a reliable subordinate, commandere a carriage, and take a spin through Ancient Rome.
Activating the First-Person Feature
As a city-building game, the game Anno 117 is normally experienced from a bird's-eye view. Yet, when you press a covert button sequence — for example “Ctrl,” “Shift,” and “R” on keyboard or “Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B/Circle, A/X” on console — you can explore your domain as a common citizen. Because an analogous secret was part of the earlier game Anno 1800, I was eager to try it out in the new release, yet I had doubts it would operate until I found myself chin-deep in a Celtic floorboard (which probably wasn’t intended — this option can be a little buggy at times).
Exploring the Streets of Rome
After extracting myself, I walked the bustling streets across my settlement and visited stalls, alehouses, blossom gardens, and seafood collectors — the experience was splendid to see the fruits of my labor from a brand-new perspective. I detected numerous fine points I might have missed from above: Front door decorations, an ass transporting a floral pail, chickens running loose, folks chilling on their balconies… Merely examining the form of a ledge and the paint layers on a column becomes engaging to modern individuals unfamiliar with ancient life.
Further Than Mere Wandering
But there’s more to Anno 117’s first-person mode aside from meandering through streets. I felt particularly pleased when I found out that besides being able to view crop lands, but also step into them. And even though I thought the building models would be off-limits, I was able to enter earthen quarries, investigate a respected schoolhouse while lessons were in session, and even trespass into people’s gardens. Avoid attempting to open doors (not even the creators have the budget for that), yet it's completely feasible meander across a cereal plantation, watch folks shoveling and carrying sacks, and look within any modest shelter when there's no doorway obstructing.
Appearance and Mood
Although I was fully prepared to witness my city rendered using primitive rendering, excluding a few unpolished motions and periodic inhabitants sitting in a bench as opposed to atop a bench, the immersive perspective seems considerably improved over predictions. The intricately designed surfaces (especially stone surfaces) are unexpectedly excellent in what is still, essentially, a top-down game. You won't necessarily notice specific hair details, yet you will notice writings on surfaces, fiery particles from lamps, fading on bricks, pupils, and evergreen foliage. Evening, with glowing light sources and distant stellar illumination, is especially atmospheric, and feels much less frightening relative to the previous game, given that the populace appears unlike nightmarish entities now.
Discovery and Modification
Because the game's hidden immersive perspective has no guided tutorial, I decided to experiment a bit, and quickly discovered the abilities to leap, run, and changing perspective — the zoom function permitting me to switch between first and third-person views and back. I then experimented with some number buttons and found I could alter my avatar's look. Amber garment? Crimson attire? Sapphire and amethyst dress? Or — perhaps even better — full armor? You can wield a blade and protection, or, my favorite, don a marksman outfit; if you activate the engage command, 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).
Comedy and Population Encounters
Yet, I didn't want to damage my population, because they’re way too funny. Only seconds after I landed the first-person view, 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 gran will have your head.” Appropriate response, paternal figure. A pleasant regional Celt then started applauding my brilliant Romano-Celtic policies by describing it as “Ideal combination,” meanwhile a grumpy senior female chose to intimidate me: “Utter those words again, and your fate will be sealed.”
The Fun of Vehicle Use
At the moment I believed I uncovered all possible content within the game's immersive perspective, I experienced the pleasure of driving in Ancient Rome. Completely unexpectedly, I clicked on a wagon and immediately found myself in the driver's position. Cattle, asses, even manually drawn vehicles; you may operate any of them freely. The donkey-powered transport, notably, travels rather rapidly, although you shouldn't expect open-world vehicular chaos — you can’t drive into people or other wagons (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. Sporting my soldier fit, I ran up to the enemy in the midst of battle and attempted to attack them, yet was completely overlooked. The front-row seat was still rather spectacular, and watching the enemy run, their arms flailing about, proved very satisfying, but it would’ve been cool to actually hit something via my incendiary bolts.
