EXPEDITIONS: ROME

Swords, sandals, and a serious RPG under the toga

- Jon Bolding

The Expeditions series has invaded Mesoamerica with the Conquistadors and raided England with the Vikings, taking the idea of a historical RPG from a niche concept to a fan favorite. Now, Expeditions is going to ancient Rome, and it’s asking players to become one of the greatest conquerors of the age.

Expeditions: Rome is the latest in the series, coming this year. It’s a sprawling work of historical fiction set in a world where the player’s custom character walks in the footsteps of Julius Caesar. Like previous games in the series, Rome won’t focus on a precise retelling of the history, but rather use history as a jumping-off point. It’s also going to take advantage of the new setting to shake up the underlying RPG mechanics, making the tactical battles more exciting and faster-paced than they were before.

“We never want to constrain ourselves to writing about specific events in history, but rather think about how to stay true to historical figures, periods, and details such as how people dress, how they’re armed, their religion, their view on other cultures, and so on,” says Jonas Wæver, creative director at Logic Artists. Wæver has a passion for history—his father was a history teacher, and gave him “quite the stack of books” as mandatory reading about Rome. The studio’s spin on Roman history shows in what I saw of the game, including some social encounters and combats spread across three regions of the ancient world: Asia Minor (part of Turkey these days), Egypt, and Gaul (now known as France).