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Recently we sat down with the team at Ubisoft Mainz (Ubisoft Blue Byte) to check out their upcoming realtime strategy entry, Anno 117: Pax Romana, followed by an extensive hands-on look at the game in motion.  Shortly after you read this you’ll get your own more brief look at the game thanks to a fresh new demo, but our extended time with the game showcased a massive uplift over the previous title back in 2019.  Whether you’re a fan of the ANNO series, or a newcomer to Ubisoft’s city builder, there’s a lot to like here.  Improvements are nearly everywhere you look, and on top of a gorgeous new look.  Settle in as we head back to the past – welcome to Anno 117: Pax Romana.

The phrase Pax Romana is Latin for “Roman Peace” and represented a real-world nearly 200 year “golden age” where the Roman Empire expanded dramatically, establishing itself as the most prosperous and powerful entities the ancient world had ever known.  This expansion occurred under a grouping of what is colloquially known as the “Five Good Emperors” – rulers who, from the years 96 to 180 CE, ushered in an era of relative peace, prosperity, and a nearly unbreakable hegemonic power.  It’s during this time that the newest Anno takes place.  

The game begins on a humble island known as Latium, the heart of the Pax Empire.  This backdrop represents the earliest setting for an Anno title thus far, as well as the perfect backdrop to create your legacy – your empire.  

It’s immediately obvious that the Blue Byte team has been working hard to be more than another Anno game in a new setting.  Right from the start, the improvements are everywhere you look.  Some small, some large, all of these represent a shot in the arm that fans like me should appreciate. 

The first major change I noticed was a greater emphasis on choices.  While I was learning about how to rebuild my fledgling island from its ruinous state, I was presented with an ever-expanding list of choices, many times opening up decisions that would change the course of my city’s growth as either an economic powerhouse or through military might.  Before these expanded greatly, however, I was faced with simple challenges to learn how to play the game.  It’s here that it became readily apparent that the team is working hard on new player onboarding, something that arguably had been lacking in previous titles.  

In any good builder, the first thing you’ll learn is how to place things like homes for your citizens.  You can now place items at an angle, allowing you to deviate from the giant blocks so often seen in games like this.  I was also happy to see that you can flip their orientation, or even select them and move them entirely instead of having to tear them down.  It makes redistricting a breeze.  Similarly, you can now multi-select areas, or even select all of one type of building for upgrade or downgrade.  These sorts of tool improvements are pervasive throughout.  

With homes built and citizens moving in, they’ll be ready to toil for the empire.  Giving them work is easy enough, but a new system for building production chains is also here.  If you are, for example, making clothes for your citizens – a requirement needed to move from a basic shanty to something more stately, you’ll need two inputs. You’ll need flax to create the cloth, and a field of dye plants. That meant not only constructing a farm, but also the fields to help it produce the necessary materials.  

While we didn’t get to play with it yet, there’s a second side to this coin – the province of Albion.  While Latium will follow the traditional path laid forth by the Empire, Albion has a different choice, literally.  Rather than following the gradual “Romanization” of the Empire, you can instead allow your citizens to choose.  Your populace can choose the Roman way, or they could also choose the local way instead.  Both are valid choices, with vastly different visual styles, but also requiring completely different inputs to achieve.  Where the Roman path might require more hardened clay tiles, and thus clay burners and water-side extraction, the local path might have more focus on locally-harvested limestone and all that entails.  These are more than mere cosmetic choices, instead affecting gameplay and ensuring that no two cities, even ones built by you, will ever look or operate the same.  Using the same example as above, instead of using flax for your cloth you could instead set up a sheep farm, or perhaps what you need will require you set up a trade route with a neighbor.  Solving these logistical problems should be a lot of what makes Anno 117 fun.  

Logistics also sees a new feature that blends two new elements.  You’ll now have a great deal more variety in terrain.  Rocky mountainsides, forests, marshes, verdant waterways, and sea ports all offer opportunity for not only commerce, but mining, fishing, forestry, and more.  Where you place things like sawmills have a direct impact on the efficacy of the logging industry connected to it.  How close related buildings and infrastructure are located can have a similar impact.  

Adjusting neighborhood layouts is often an issue that eventually plagues every city builder.  Wincing, you’d have to destroy large swaths of structures to improve your layout.  That’s no longer the case in Anno 117.  Here, you can pick up a building, rotate it, place it elsewhere, adjust the roads (which are a lot more intelligent now, wrapping around corners and interconnecting where it makes sense), and otherwise restructure a neighborhood easily.  There has to be friction in games to make them fun, but the team has worked hard to make sure that the friction of the interface isn’t one of them.  

There is so much more I could cover, as the first 90 minutes with the game felt like it flew by while also being so densely packed that I’m frankly spoiled for choice for what to talk about.  I could go over the side missions to ferry would-be travellers to a nearby island to interact with their peers or others in the leading caste.  I could also talk about a gnawing feeling of whether I should expand my military and apply a great deal more pressure and control over my society rather than let their freedom guide my burgeoning economic power.  This push and pull lurked in the background as I began to worry about how anything I’ve achieved could be taken at a whim.  Do I spend my time building trade boats or triremes?  The choices were ultimately mine, and that’s the heart of what Anno 117: Pax Romana has to offer this time around – far more choice.  Expanded terrain, expanded economic engines, and expanded options for how the moment-to-moment gameplay can unfold.  The Anno series has always looked gorgeous and played well, but Anno 117 is a whole different animal.  It has a great deal of new fundamental options that look to great something far more than its predecessors.  More than an iteration, Anno 117: Pax Romana might be the best Anno the team has ever made.  We won’t have to wait too long to find out as the game ships on November 13th 2025 for PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X/S.  

Stay tuned for more on Anno 117: Pax Romana right here at GamingTrend.com – I suspect this one is going to be something special.  

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