The Anno series has always been about building worlds from the ground up, shaping societies through trade, planning, and patience. With Anno 117: Pax Romana, Ubisoft Mainz carries that legacy into the heart of the Roman Empire. The game opens with a new beginning: a governor’s first assignment at the edge of civilization, where fields and stone become the foundation of Rome’s peace.
It’s 117 AD. The Empire stands at its height, stretching across continents, and you are a newly appointed provincial governor. The story begins in Latium, the fertile homeland of Rome. The Emperor’s orders are simple: establish order, build prosperity, and extend the empire’s influence through structure and commerce. What starts as an untouched patch of countryside soon becomes the site of your first Roman settlement. The landscape, rolling hills, olive groves, and distant coastlines set the stage for everything to come. From the start, the sense of scale is grounded. You’re not leading legions, you’re laying bricks, carving roads, and turning wilderness into civilization.
This opening sequence serves as the framework for the entire experience. It introduces the building systems and economy that will drive the empire forward. You begin by surveying the terrain, plotting roads, and connecting early infrastructure. Roads matter; they guide citizens, link supply chains, and define your city’s rhythm. Your first objectives are straightforward: gather wood, harvest stone, and provide housing. Lumber camps rise near forests, and workers haul resources to makeshift warehouses. Soon, simple Roman homes appear, and your outpost begins to breathe. The early stages focus on rhythm building, producing, delivering, and repeating. Every structure feeds the next, each chain leading toward a functioning local economy. This phase isn’t about politics or warfare. It’s about learning efficiency, reading the terrain, and building stability. You’re not asked to command; you’re asked to manage to make order out of raw land, to embody the Roman ideal of structure and permanence.
Population management enters early. Your settlers need homes, food, and a sense of purpose. As their needs are met, more citizens arrive, and your economy grows. You’ll unlock basic services markets for trade, taverns for morale, and warehouses for logistics. Each service has a visible impact. Markets attract commerce, taverns spark activity and conversation. Roads fill with carts carrying supplies. Workers, farmers, and craftsmen move through your city with routine precision. Even at this early stage, the settlement feels alive more than numbers on a screen; it’s a living microcosm of Roman society. But growth brings challenges. Bakeries can spark fires. Workshops produce smoke that lowers residential appeal. Placement becomes a quiet puzzle: how to balance efficiency, safety, and citizen happiness. It’s a lesson that defines the Anno identity progress is always a matter of equilibrium.
Visually, this first act captures the Roman world with detail and restraint. The architecture is clean and functional red tiled roofs, marble courtyards, and public fountains. Workers in tunics move under the sun, their routines forming the heartbeat of your early city. The environment shapes strategy. Farms thrive near fertile plains while quarries fit along rocky ridges. Latium’s geography dictates how you build, making the world feel tactile rather than abstract. Every hill and coastline has a purpose, reminding you that Rome’s order must adapt to nature’s layout. Music and ambience reinforce the atmosphere. Strings, flutes, and distant chatter blend with the hum of work. There’s no grand fanfare here, just the steady rhythm of construction, the sound of empire in its infancy.
As the settlement grows, production chains become more intricate. Grain fields supply mills, mills feed bakeries, and markets distribute bread. Each link supports the next, teaching the player how to sustain momentum. Trade begins on a local scale. Caravans move between storage depots, balancing surplus and demand. The mechanics are simple but satisfying; they lay the groundwork for the global networks hinted at later in the game. Every successful connection feels earned. You see your decisions take shape in visible systems, goods flowing, citizens thriving, and the settlement expanding outward. The satisfaction doesn’t come from spectacle but from control, watching the machinery of a Roman town begin to function as intended. Even at this early point, the title’s theme peace through order, resonates. This phase captures the idea that an empire isn’t just forged by conquest but maintained through structure. Your work as governor is administrative, not martial. The real weapon here is planning. Messages from the imperial capital occasionally arrive, reminding you that you serve the Emperor’s grand vision. Rome expects results, but how you achieve them is up to you. The tone remains calm and procedural, fitting the promise of Pax Romana: a world ruled by roads, trade, and governance rather than swords.
The Promise Ahead
By the end of this opening section, your settlement stands complete as a functioning Roman town built from nothing but ambition and stone. The roads connect, the granaries are stocked, and your people thrive. It’s not yet an empire, but it feels like the beginning of one.
