PAX AUGUSTA

The exciting new Roman city- builder that wasn't built in a day

- Ian Evenden

My father has entirely too much confidence in me. He’s sending me out with a few denari in my pocket to establish a city, and expects to see me return as a successful official. It’s a lot of pressure, and it’s only made worse by the discovery my mother knows the local governor.

I've already proven my utter incompetence by being unable to identify a robber who attacked me on the road, potentially landing us with a court case for kidnapping after the house slaves rounded up some likely suspects for an ID parade. I've only been playing the game for five minutes, have built just two small temples on my father's orders, and now the governor wants a bribe.

Pax Augusta is a city-builder set in ancient Rome, and casts you as a fledgling civil servant burdened by high parental expectations and an apparent magnetism for the criminal and the corrupt. It aims for a degree of historical accuracy, with input from archaeologists to correct mistakes in its building models, and takes inspiration from visits to ancient sites.

The game, according to its Swiss developer Roger Gassmann, was born from memories of trips to such places, especially Augusta Raurica, a Roman archaeological site and open-air museum that's the site of the oldest known Roman colony on the Rhine. The game is set in northern Gaul and Germania, so the Swiss settlement, on a high plateau above the river, makes for a clear inspiration. “I was a very bad student,” he says. “I had to learn things that didn't interest me. At some point we had Roman history. That was very boring. When we went to Augusta Raurica with the class, I saw the ruins for the first time and thought to myself, ‘They made all that by hand back then.’ I was immediately enthusiastic. Looking back, I noticed that I learn very well when I see things and see the connection between theory and practice.”