Classical Antiquity in Video Games: Playing with the Ancient World

Description

From gaming consoles to smartphones, video games are everywhere today, including those set in historical times and particularly in the ancient world. This volume explores the varied depictions of the ancient world in video games and demonstrates the potential challenges of games for scholars as well as the applications of game engines for educational and academic purposes. With successful series such as "Assassin's Creed" or "Civilization" selling millions of copies, video games rival even television and cinema in their role in shaping younger audiences' perceptions of the past. Yet classical scholarship, though embracing other popular media as areas of research, has so far largely ignored video games as a vehicle of classical reception. This collection of essays fills this gap with a dedicated study of receptions, remediations and representations of Classical Antiquity across all electronic gaming platforms and genres. It presents cutting-edge research in classics and classical receptions, game studies and archaeogaming, adopting different perspectives and combining papers from scholars, gamers, game developers and historical consultants. In doing so, it delivers the first state-of-the-art account of both the wide array of 'ancient' video games, as well as the challenges and rewards of this new and exciting field.

Christian Rollinger is Senior Lecturer in Ancient History at the University of Trier, Germany. He is co-editor of the online journal Thersites: Journal for Transcultural Presences & Diachronic Identities from Antiquity to Date.

[This] is an interesting collection which will be an important reference for the growing number of works on gaming and classical reception in ancient history. * Bryn Mawr Classical Review * A valuable addition to the sub-discipline of Reception Studies, and invaluable to anyone interested in learning more about classics, ancient history, and classical archaeology in computer games. * Classics for All * There is no doubt that the pieces collected by Rollinger amply fulfil his main objective, that of showing interested historians all the possibilities offered by this new and attractive field of study. This collection makes a valuable contribution to the field, not only because it will inspire further research on the subject matter, but also because it will be especially interesting for all those players whose core passion is reliving ancient history in the first person. * The Classical Review * There are many merits to this volume and important new paths of research are highlighted ... [The book] demonstrates the importance of the study of video games for research into multiple areas of ancient world studies ... [It] offers exciting opportunities for everybody interested in ancient history. * Manchester Game Studies Network * A fine example of what an impressive range of scholars can achieve when they look beyond the player's point of view to consider the broader issues of how, in video games, history is invoked and constructed, game and software architectures are deployed, and player attention is pursued. -- Thomas M. Malaby, Professor of Anthropology, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, USA It opens windows of immense opportunities that will undoubtedly serve as a "playground" for Francophone researchers. * Revue des Etudes Anciennes [Bloomsbury Translation] *