With its architectural triumphs, rich culture, and political intrigue, Ancient Rome already seems a perfect setting for Ubisoft’s city-building strategy game Anno 117: Pax Romana. But as I discovered in my first few hours of playtime, the Ancient Romans’ tendency to be ridiculously finicky about city planning, sniff lavender, and set their own houses on fire also makes the game feel surprisingly authentic.
Let’s start with the glaringly obvious: Anno 117: Pax Romana looks stunning. The scenery, with its shimmering ocean, impressive rock formations, and variety of flora and fauna, is gorgeous, but even more so are the building models; all house types come with seven different appearances, with each type showing intricate details such as gardens, amphoras, decorative tile flooring, fountains, and tables laden with food. Whereas the sea and barren rock textures look a bit patchy up close, you can zoom in on any part of your town to discover all kinds of lovely details; shiny hides, weathered wood, a cat sneaking around… But the prize for “best model in the game” should go to the so-called pleasure barge, clearly modeled after Emperor Caligula’s lavish Nemi ships.
At the risk of frying my Windows PC, I compared the ultra-high graphics to medium, and I didn’t see a staggering difference — the crops look significantly worse, but the roads and rooftops are fine. I always find crowd density to be especially important for a world’s liveliness, but even the lowest crowd density in Anno 117 looks quite lively. When fully zoomed out, all citizens will disappear, but you’ll still see carts, individual trees, windows, and pillars. For me, the sweet spot in Anno 117 is to zoom halfway in, so you get all the gorgeous characteristics without losing oversight.
Sadly, Anno 117’s user index didn’t receive the same attention to detail. Devoid of any Roman-themed decorative elements, the simple, predominantly white icons against an even blue background look incredibly bland. The mini-map is nothing impressive either, and the choice to put a square map inside a circular map is a complete mystery to me; why not choose one or the other?
What I do like about Anno 117’s UI, however, is its simplicity. You’ve got your basic info at the top, important menus listed on the left, and three big buttons to separate troops, ships, and buildings at the bottom, with shortcuts for roads, residential buildings, and warehouses besides. The only thing that takes some getting used to is the resource trees; if you want to build a pig farm, for example, you’ll have to select the associated civilian group (plebeians, in this case), select an end product that requires pig hides or renderer, and then click on the pig icon. This interconnectedness is a staple of the Anno series, and certainly a fun way to work toward an end product, but it may take a bit of time to memorize the resource locations.
Besides the resource trees, it’s a good thing Anno 117: Pax Romana’s menus are quite straightforward, because the tutorial is horrendous. Despite having played many city-building games, I faced a steep learning curve in my first two hours. For example, the first tutorial objective in Anno 117 is to place a woodcutter and a sawmill, but doesn’t explain where to find these buildings. Later on, when my citizens lacked a specific product, I didn’t receive any warnings — apparently, I should’ve figured that out by studying the statistics menu despite being a brand-new player. There are no hands-on examples or highlighted buttons in Anno 117; just brief pop-ups telling you what to do, without further info on how to do it.
Once I figured everything out, though, I had a blast playing Anno 117: Pax Romana. I love the shared warehouse inventory and free relocation features, both of which allow me to focus on island-wide resource management and the happiness of my citizens rather than remain preoccupied with infrastructural challenges. Ranged area effects, such as improved happiness around lavender fields and higher population growth around sandal shops, offer creative ways to improve districts without ever becoming too much of a micro-management hassle.
I also appreciate the careful balancing act that comes with city growth. When I tried to figure out why my citizens were being ungrateful, and noticed that a large chunk of their unhappiness was caused by “city status,” I initially assumed this meant my citizens desired a more prestigious city, but soon discovered it was actually the opposite; the larger the city, the higher the citizens’ unhappiness. Fast growth clearly isn’t everything.
As if my citizens’ tendency to fall ill, riot, and reenact The Great Fire of Rome doesn’t keep me busy enough, Anno 117’s campaign mode features a surprisingly intriguing storyline to shake things up. Of course, you can play Anno 117 in endless mode, but the opportunity to meet characters and learn more about their lives greatly enhances the historical immersion. At the same time, I appreciate the fact that the campaign quests aren’t time-sensitive, granting me the freedom to pursue the next plot twist or focus on town management for a while — whichever I prefer.
Eager to try a different map, I swapped the Roman “Latium” for the Celtic “Albion” region in endless mode, which was a nice — albeit wet and muddy — change of pace. Not only does this unlock new citizenry, resources, and products, but it also presents an interesting governance choice between Romanizing the locals and running with Celtic tradition.
However, Anno 117: Pax Romana’s reliance on predominantly rectangular town layouts makes me partial to the Latium region. You see, although Anno 117 expands the usual horizontal and vertical road and building placements with diagonal lines, there’s little opportunity to craft towns with a more natural, chaotic, and round-ish shape, and neither does it include automatic model adjustments to fit triangular spaces, such as 45-degree corners (shoutout to Manor Lords). This limitation, however, is felt far more strongly in Albion than in Latium.
Had Anno 117 been “Anno 1242” (or thereabouts) instead, the straight roads and 90-degree crossings would’ve felt incredibly unnatural. But since we’re in Ancient Roman times, it’s actually quite authentic, as real Roman cities also sported a neat grid layout consisting of a central forum surrounded by orderly, rectangular city blocks. The Romans would’ve taken this layout to their Celtic colonies, but pre-existing towns and local influences would’ve created more of a mixture between both city types, so I would’ve liked the opportunity to add more circular shapes in Albion.
Mind you, I haven’t finished the campaign yet or fought many battles, but so far, I don’t want to leave the year 117. A city-building game that looks stunning, feels authentic, comes with a cool story, and satisfies my craving for historical authenticity? I thought I’d never see the day!
