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Surprisingly — did you realize you can play the game Anno 117 using a first-person camera? If that’s your reaction, you’re just as shocked as I was the moment I learned this secret option. Allow me to briefly leave overseeing my civilization, leave it in a capable deputy, commandere a carriage, and take a spin around the classical city.

Unlocking the First-Person Mode

Being a city-building title, the game Anno 117 is normally experienced using a top-down camera. However, if you input a hidden code — such as “Ctrl,” “Shift,” and “R” on keyboard or else “Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B/Circle, A/X” on a controller — you can explore the empire as an ordinary Roman. Given a comparable hidden feature appeared in Anno 1800, I felt excited to test it in Ubisoft's newest game, though I was uncertain it would operate until I found myself stuck in a Celtic building (which probably wasn’t intended — this option can be somewhat unstable occasionally).

Discovering the Streets of Rome

Once I crawled out, I walked the bustling streets across my settlement and toured stalls, alehouses, flower fields, and cockle pickers — the experience was splendid to observe the fruits of my labor from a brand-new perspective. I observed a variety of intricacies that would escape notice from above: Front door decorations, an ass transporting a floral pail, fowl roaming freely, folks chilling on their balconies… Merely examining the design of a windowsill and the paint layers on a column is quite interesting to modern individuals unfamiliar with ancient life.

Beyond Simple Strolling

Yet, the experience extends to the game's immersive perspective than strolling along the road. I felt particularly pleased 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 could walk onto earthen quarries, tour an esteemed educational structure during active classes, and invade personal courtyards. Avoid attempting to open doors (not even the creators planned for that functionality), yet it's completely feasible meander across a cereal plantation, observe people digging and transporting bags, and look within any modest shelter as long as the door is absent.

Appearance and Mood

Even though I expected to observe my settlement depicted using primitive rendering, besides some crude animations and periodic inhabitants sitting inside seating instead of on a bench, the first-person view appears far superior to anticipations. The intricately designed surfaces (especially stone surfaces) really have no business being this good in what is still, essentially, a top-down game. You won't necessarily notice separate follicular elements, but you will see writings on surfaces, fiery particles from lamps, fading on bricks, iris elements, and evergreen foliage. Evening, with glowing light sources and celestial bodies twinkling afar, generates a uniquely immersive environment, and also a lot less scary versus the earlier title, now that the citizens don’t look like nightmarish entities these days.

Testing and Personalization

Given the covert first-person feature doesn’t come with an instruction manual, I opted to try different commands, and immediately located the functions for jumping, dashing, and adjusting the view — the zoom function permitting me to change from first-person to third-person mode and back. I then decided to hit various digit inputs and learned I could modify my representative's visual design. Golden robe? Crimson attire? Azure and violet outfit? Or — maybe superior — complete battle gear? You can wield a blade and protection, or, my favorite, don a marksman outfit; when you press the action key, you launch incendiary bolts heavenward. In case you’re wondering, it’s not possible to kill civilians (not that I’ve tried, of course).

Comedy and Population Encounters

But I wouldn’t wish to harm my citizens anyway, 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 should you provide another poultry, your grandmother will be furious.” Understandable stance, father character. One lovely local Celt then began complimenting my brilliant Romano-Celtic policies by describing it as “Ideal combination,” while some cranky old lady decided to threaten me: “Utter those words again, and your fate will be sealed.”

The Fun of Vehicle Use

Just as I assumed I uncovered all possible content in Anno 117: Pax Romana’s first-person mode, I found the joys of joyriding across historical settings. Entirely by accident, I selected a carriage and immediately found myself in the driver's position. Cattle, asses, even people-powered transports; you may operate any of them freely. The donkey-powered transport, notably, moves quite quickly, though you shouldn’t imagine any GTA-like shenanigans — colliding with pedestrians or other carts is impossible (again, not saying I’ve tried).

Combat Limitations

The only thing that disappointed me within the immersive perspective was finding out I couldn’t partake in battle encounters. Equipped in warrior attire, I ran up to the enemy during active combat and attempted to attack them, but was entirely disregarded. The front-row seat remained quite impressive, and seeing opponents retreat, their limbs waving wildly, proved very satisfying, but it would’ve been cool to effectively strike targets with my burning arrows.

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