Anno 117: Pax Romana is the forthcoming entry to the long-running city-builder franchise, and we had the great pleasure of getting an early taste of what’s ahead.
Though the recent demo only served us a small morsel, this early hands-on gave us almost the full course, allowing us to explore the content and mechanics of the Ubisoft title. And I must say I am more than impressed: so much in fact that I’m inclined to call this the best Anno experience I’ve ever had.
Here’s the full preview.
If if ain’t broke, don’t fix it
Anno 117 retains most of what we’ve come to expect from the franchise. This hands-on, which runs through the story’s first Chapter and up to the Patrician (fourth level) in sandbox, gave me a lot of insight into the intricacies of Pax Romana. I spent about 10 hours total on it, stopping only because I had to.
As I was saying, this is very much an Anno experience: you set up shop on an island, build up, fulfill needs to level up, wage war or diplomacy with surrounding governors and so on. Where it differs is that it gives you two options, which can vary significantly depending on your playstyle. You can either play in Albion, in the Roman province of Britannia, where Celtic tribes and their culture dominate, or you can go to Latium and build the Roman town of your dreams.
Depending on how you choose to play, you’ll either dabble in Romans and their class structure, from lowly commoners to Patricians and beyond, or in the Celtic one-with-nature way of life, exploiting deep forests, swamps, and marshlands. Celts can also be Romanized, allowing you to form somewhat of a hybrid culture if you so choose, though Romanization will happen to some degree no matter what, as you are a Roman governor in a Celtic land.
The story, too, has two characters, each with their own story and circumstances, but I’ll get to that later in the article.
Anno 117: Pax Romana is very much an Anno title. All the mechanical structures are there, and you should feel right at home once you’ve fired it up after, say, 1404 or 1800. It does streamline some processes a bit, however: you could easily run out of necessary resources to fulfill the needs of your citizens in titles like Anno 1800, but here there are no such gauges.
Managing your province is much easier and approachable, and you won’t run the risk of suddenly losing thousands of ducats for no apparent reason. Even with these optimizations and streamlining, 117 sticks close to previous titles, and I found that great since something that works right does not require much fixing.
Some aspects you will come to recognize as “new,” but that mostly comes from this ancient setting, as well as some of the refinements to the more annoying parts of the formula.
An actually intriguing story
While the stories of such games were never the main focus, Anno 117 seems to have taken the extra step in this department, trying to craft a compelling narrative that is woven well into the game’s core. You can choose one of two characters, Marcus or Marcia, both of whom have their own intricacies and stories. Marcus got appointed as a governor seemingly out of nowhere, whereas Marcia is getting married to one against her will, forced to fall in line with Roman customs.
Mystery and intrigue surround both characters, and Marcia’s story especially had quite the depth, commenting on society, culture, and history.
While the writing isn’t the best out there, nor is the story particularly amazing, it’s no kid’s tale either. There’s emotion, thematic depth, and effort that was put into executing that while allowing you to experience Anno as it should be played: managing and building a city.
I only got to play the first chapter, at whose end the story is transferred to Albion, further including the game’s core content into the story, letting you familiarize yourself with everything before moving on to the sandbox mode.
It isn’t the game’s strongest point, but it’s a lot more effort than I expected a city builder’s story mode to have.
The best assets in the series
Anno 117: Pax Romana has some of the prettiest, most detailed assets out of any city builder I’ve ever played. The story mode especially has breathtaking locations, with temples and entire villas built on mountaintops or hidden Roman pirate coves retaining the intricacies of their culture’s broader architecture. Other civilizations and towns also invoke a sense of awe, even as just pixels on a screen.
The Roman culture buildings, much more so than the Celtic ones, are so well-designed that I can’t wait to see what the most skilled players will produce. The opportunities here of making the best town in the history of Anno are off the charts, though I can’t say I’ve managed to put together something that isn’t completely unsightly.
Ubisoft really put in the effort in this department, which is probably the most important one (save for, of course, the gameplay, which was bound to be great anyway, given how good the Anno formula is by default). Hence, I have to say, when all things are considered, that this could very well be the best Anno game ever made. But that conclusion will have to be postponed until the full release, which is when I’ll get to see the full extent of the game’s content.
And, as I know you’ll want to know, the performance is pretty good. I ran the game on my laptop that sports a power-limited Ryzen 7735HS and had a pleasurable experience, with frames staying constant and stable throughout my time with the game. There were a few differences between first-launch frames and when my towns covered entire islands, so the optimization seems to be in order here.
However, full releases have a lot more going on, so we’ll wait and see.
As it stands, Ubisoft has done something great here, and I can’t wait to have more of it.
Like our content? Set Destructoid as a Preferred Source on Google in just one step to ensure you see us more frequently in your Google searches!
The post Anno 117 Pax Romana Preview – A major contender for the series’ best appeared first on Destructoid.
