My time with Anno 117: Pax Romana can be summed up as gentle, as well as a little bit funny. Ubisoft Mainz’s typically historical real-time strategy city-building series had largely been off my radar until I dabbled in 2019’s Anno 1800. That game scratched a whole bunch of brain itches I didn’t really know I had, allowing me to take my sweet time planning out the neat grids of my soon thriving (coughs) colonial settlement. As a basic modern man, I find myself more prone to ruminating on the past glories of the Roman Empire rather than the exploitative trade dominance of the industrial era. With three hours spent building up my first island in the campaign, I’ve already invested enough energy to gradually dominate this archipelago with my ancient forms of soft power and commerce. I just didn’t realise how much party planning and marital subterfuge would be required to pull it off.
When launching the story-driven campaign of Anno 117, a series of basic questions is asked of the player. Firstly, which of the two fully voiced characters will represent our endeavours? Marcia Tertia or Marcus Naukratius. I chose Marcia, who mysteriously introduces herself as an ‘imposter’ destined to marry against her will.
After this, the game kindly asks if you would like to activate co-op and kick things off with a mate. While I’m unfamiliar with the nature of co-op play in this series, it promises to allow players to complete the campaign’s questlines in tandem. An upside would be sharing the burden of managing a vastly growing supply of resources and events alongside others. I plan on seeing the co-op in action soon, and hope that the respective player progress in the story doesn’t have players stepping on one another’s toes to keep abreast of developments.
Cannot believe I’m planning parties for the elite while also constructing industries for the plebs
Finally, after ticking a few boxes and opting for a full tutorial experience, I’m ready to start governing my first island: Juliana. When I immediately tried changing the settlement’s name, my advisor pops up and tells me off. He firmly scolds me, telling me that men more important than my Marcia will decide this island’s name. The first of many cheeky bits of friction, presumably for levity’s sake. Ah, classical sexism.
Both player character options come loaded with their own story context that ties into a surprisingly active, albeit unserious, political drama. A merchant’s daughter, Marcia’s specific story is appealing to me because she is thrust into the role of city building with seemingly no preparation. After an arranged marriage with a wealthy groom who didn’t even show up for the ceremony, Marcia is immediately dropped on her marital estates and told to develop them for the glory of her husband and the Emperor. It’s a comically rapid setup that doesn’t waste time getting us into the game.
Emperor Lucius is but one of many characters that pop up for talking head exchanges while you’re gently inducted into the basics of governing. Several events will occur, with the respective advisors and stakeholders FaceTiming you from across the seas to weigh in on current events. They are brief intermissions from managing the economic and well-being systems of your city, often with decisions and consequences to follow.
The voice acting, though, is a mixed bag. Similar to Anno 1800, the characters have rather goofy writing and delivery. If there is much attempt at setting up a grander narrative here, the dialogue and event writing kind of undercuts the sincerity. It won’t get in the way of anyone’s enjoyment, and there is fun to be had by leaning into the hamminess of it all.
I’m no civic planner, but I’m proud of my little Juliana
Ubisoft Mainz makes a terrific first impression with its continued interface improvements. Selecting the full tutorial experience, I expected to be slammed with information boxouts and aggressive handholding. Instead, I was met with an elegant and low-impact introduction that seamlessly brings the player up to speed without having to sit through lesson after lesson on the many systems. Even better, there’s virtually no front-loading when starting the campaign, even with all of the tutorials on. Things begin low-stakes and curious, with one simple objective at a time. Build a timber mill, a road, and a warehouse. Connect them to a trading post. Only the most crucial of UI pop-ups will blast the player’s attention with an expectation of comprehension. Just click around, and if you make a mistake, right-clicking the mouse will bring up a tool wheel that will fix you up immediately.
Information is always elegantly and contextually available to the player without dominating screen space. Select a resource on screen, choose one of its associated facilities, while all connected industries are highlighted in green. There are always discreet help icons embedded on the sides of panels as concise and informative tuck-away references. Virtually everything you need to access in the first hours is, at most, two intuitive clicks away.
There’s also a little quality-of-life treat for those who love magnetic auto-alignments in their document processors and photo editors. Roads and buildings will click into place, all perfectly aligned as the gods intended.
In terms of the actual objectives, the big one is obvious. Build your city. But there are many smaller, critical objectives that pop up along the way that had me giggling to myself, unsure of the intended hilarity. One main-mission-adjacent objective in the first hours has you hover over another island’s hospital. The Emperor tells you this is where your absent, old, and ailing husband is currently residing. With each prompted visit, I click on the hospital only to have an advisor give me a new excuse as to why I cannot see my supposedly betrothed. Firstly, only slaves can enter the hospital wards. Each time I visit after this, as the game progresses, I’ve been advised that my boo Titanius is always coming down with a new illness. Gout, colic, poor humour. Boy, it sure would be funny if he weren’t alive, or didn’t even exist. At one point, the Emperor was even trying to extort me for Titanius’ hospital dues. I told him where to go, with no warning of the possible consequences. That could be exciting.
I adore the implied sneakiness involved in attempting to eyeball your ‘sick’ husband
By the end of my preview, I have successfully built my first Villa, a base of operations that each island can house one of. From here, I will want to build a military to defend it, with a tutorial explaining the rock, paper, scissors triangle of the three main military units: cavalry, archers, and spearmen. I have also been given the responsibility of assigning a patron god. Each island can also select a patron god. Of the seven to choose from, I could choose from three: Ceres, Neptune and Mars. They provided benefits to the production of land, sea, and military industries, respectively. Seeing no immediate threats on my secluded island, I opted to keep things steady and go with Ceres.
There are a few little bugs here and there, sure to be ironed out after release. Some info boxes don’t populate information, important characters might bark their dialogue lines multiple times in a row, and geometry might flicker between a couple of different shapes. Nothing to impact my experience negatively, though.
Ultimately, the early hours of Anno 117 are going to look strikingly familiar to anybody coming over from Anno 1800. This is a good thing, as that had the most welcoming interface to date, outdone by iterative improvements implemented here. As the second act of the story is about to begin, I will now look towards how to manage my land and sea military–as a real-time strategy stooge, this may be my undoing. However, learning the lessons of Ancient Rome has been a breeze that, thus far, has eased the anxieties I have for this genre. March on for Pax Romana!
Anno 117: Pax Romana releases on PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC on November 13.
Previewed on PC using code provided by the publisher
