Announcement

Release date of version 1.0

Never Second in Rome Demo · published 21 Apr 2026, 10:24 UTC

All events Players around this date Read on Steam

I'm happy to announce that Never Second in Rome will leave Early Access on May 5, 2026.

Since the first playable version of the game came out, there has been a demand for the introduction of some form of meta-progression, following on the heels of my first game, A Legionary's Life. Although Never Second in Rome was not designed to include meta-progression, I offered to open a discussion with the player base as soon as the story part of the game was completed, which happened last month.

The discussion provided a lot of interesting feedback, and a good compromise was reached.

The biggest change of version 1.0 will involve an optional Ironman mode that includes both meta-progression and permadeath. It will be unlocked after finishing the game at least once in Standard mode. In Ironman mode you will receive points at the end of each game, according to several accomplishments: your centurion rank, the awards won by you and your subordinates, and whether you survived until the end.

The top five games will generate a combined weighted score that will allow buying improvements for the next run, in the form of extra Attribute points, a Mentor feature that provides a bonus to the Skill training of the century, both as a whole and as individuals, and a little extra starting money.

The release update will also incorporate many more changes and tweaks, mostly aimed at easing up the difficulty a bit.

Other announcements

All events

In-game event21 Jul 2026Update 1.3.2Colors have been added to the battle and combat logs to help identify information more quickly. · In the battle log, some elements have been revised and changed. · Quick fade-out messages have been added to the battle UI in correspondence of the Initiative/Momentum/Advantage rolls of the Melee phase and of the rolls of the Throw phase. They can be disabled through a setting in the usual Gamepla…Major update22 Jun 2026Update 1.2The most important changes of this update concern four Attributes: Strength, Constitution, Quickness and Coordination. Experienced players already know the importance and effectiveness of Endurance, to the point that the other four physical Attributes felt less relevant, especially Constitution. The newly introduced changes aim at reinforcing their usefulness in combat and at offering more stra…In-game event25 May 2026Update 1.1.3Today's update introduces a few QoL improvements, the most important of which is an option to increase the speed of the battle rolls. Just like other similar settings, you can find it in the Gameplay tab of the Options. I have also revised the way altars work: now they add a bonus to your legionaries' Combativeness as well, both as a unit and at individual level. It is smaller than the bonus re…