Anno 117: Pax Romana's Best-Kept Secret Turns Out to Be a Impressive First-Person Mode.
Hold on — were you aware you can play the game Anno 117 from a first-person viewpoint? If you're thinking that, you’re just as shocked as my own reaction upon finding out this secret option. I must step away from overseeing my civilization, leave it in a reliable subordinate, take a wagon, and enjoy a ride around the classical city.
How to Access the First-Person Mode
As a city-building game, the game Anno 117 is typically played from a bird's-eye view. But, should you enter a secret combination — such as “Ctrl,” “Shift,” and “R” on a keyboard or “Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B/Circle, A/X” with a gamepad — it becomes possible to roam your domain as a common citizen. Given a comparable hidden feature appeared in the previous Anno title, I was eager to try it out in the new release, but I wasn’t sure it would function before I discovered myself chin-deep in a Celtic floorboard (possibly an unexpected bug — this option can be prone to glitches now and then).
Roaming the Streets of Rome
Once I crawled out, I wandered the busy roads through my metropolis and explored shops, taverns, flower fields, and cockle pickers — it was glorious to see all my hard work through a fresh lens. I observed a variety of intricacies I might have missed when viewing from overhead: Front door decorations, an ass transporting a floral pail, fowl roaming freely, people relaxing on their verandas… Simply noticing the shape of a window sill and the paint layers on a column becomes engaging to someone who doesn’t live in Ancient Rome.
Further Than Mere Wandering
But there’s more to the first-person feature in Anno 117 beyond simply walking the paths. I became extraordinarily excited the moment I learned that not only could I observe farming fields, but also enter them. And although I’d assumed the building models would be off-limits, I was able to enter mud extraction sites, investigate a respected schoolhouse as teaching was underway, and intrude into private gardens. Don’t try to open any doors (not even the developers have the budget for that), however, you can definitely stroll around a barley farm, watch folks shoveling and carrying sacks, and glance into any tiny hut when there's no doorway obstructing.
Visual Quality and Atmosphere
Although I was fully prepared to observe my settlement depicted in PlayStation 1 graphics, besides some crude animations and sometimes citizens positioned inside seating as opposed to atop a bench, the first-person view appears much better than expected. The intricately designed surfaces (particularly rock faces) are unexpectedly excellent for a title that remains primarily overhead. You may not see specific hair details, but you will see wall inscriptions, sparks flying from torches, brick decoloration, iris elements, and conifer needles. Evening, with glowing light sources and stars shining in the distance, is especially atmospheric, and proves significantly less intimidating versus the earlier title, now that the citizens don’t look like terrifying apparitions these days.
Experimentation and Customization
Because the game's hidden immersive perspective doesn’t come with an instruction manual, I chose to test various actions, and immediately located the abilities to leap, run, and adjusting the view — the zoom function permitting me to alternate between immersive and external perspectives and return. I then experimented with certain numeric keys and found I could alter my character’s appearance. Golden robe? Crimson attire? Azure and violet outfit? Or — perhaps even better — full armor? You can wield a blade and protection, or, my favorite, don a marksman outfit; if you hit the interaction button, you’ll fire burning arrows into the sky. In case you’re wondering, eliminating citizens cannot be done (though I didn't test this, obviously).
Comedy and Population Encounters
But I wouldn’t wish to harm my citizens anyway, because they’re way too funny. Moments after I entered the immersive perspective, I heard a parent advising their offspring that he “Can’t have a pet fox and if you feed it one more chicken, your elder will punish you.” Rightly so, Roman dad. A pleasant regional Celt then began complimenting my outstanding integration methods by describing it as “Ideal combination,” meanwhile a grumpy senior female chose to intimidate me: “Say that one more time, and they’ll never find your body.”
The Thrill of Transportation
Just when I thought I’d discovered all there is to discover within the game's immersive perspective, I encountered the delight of riding in Ancient Rome. Entirely by accident, I selected a carriage and quickly occupied the transport. Cattle, asses, even manually drawn vehicles; you can control each one as desired. The donkey-powered transport, notably, moves quite quickly, though you shouldn’t imagine any GTA-like shenanigans — you can’t drive into people or other wagons (reiterating, without confirming testing).
Fighting Restrictions
The only thing that disappointed me in Anno 117’s first-person mode was finding out I couldn’t partake in any fighting. Wearing my military outfit, I approached opposing forces during active combat and attempted to attack them, but was entirely disregarded. The close-up view was nonetheless magnificent, and seeing opponents retreat, their appendages thrashing around, seemed enormously rewarding, yet it would have been exciting to successfully impact objects via my incendiary bolts.