Dante’s Crusades: From Personal Myth to Modern Video Games
Dante’s timeless Divine Comedy has puzzled and enchanted readers for centuries and spurred new media representations – from modern novels to video games. Why?
Assassin’s Creed comes to children’s books
Your preschooler should soon be able to follow the adventures of Ezio Auditore and the other characters from Assassin’s Creed. The makers of the best-selling video game franchise have teamed up with Adam Hargreaves, the author of the Mister Men and Little Miss picture book series.
Byzantium in video games, with Troy Goodfellow
A conversation with Troy Goodfellow on how Byzantium and other premodern civilizations are represented in video games, and how the mechanics of the games structure those representations, player’s goals, and the dynamics of historical change.
Video games: Travellers Rest
If you want to live out your dream of being a medieval tavern keeper, then you can do so with this new video game.
Video games: Medieval Archery Simulator coming soon
Image Power has released their first trailer to showcase the upcoming video game, Medieval Archery Simulator.
Explore medieval sites on Minecraft
Fans of Minecraft have two more places to explore, inspired by medieval sites from 10th century Denmark and 14th century England
Medieval Video Games with Alicia McKenzie
This week on The Medieval Podcast, it’s game on with Alicia McKenzie. Danièle and Alicia talk about the world’s love affair with medieval-themed video games, what some of the ups and downs are, and which games Alicia recommends for medieval fans staying at home.
Five ‘medieval’ video games that are coming out in 2020
The Middle Ages have often been a popular topic in video games, and there are always more on the way. Here are five games – some more historically-based than others – to look forward to in 2020.
Learning about the Middle Ages through games with Kyle Lincoln
One of the buzzwords in education is gamification – using games to get people more engaged with what they are learning. Danièle is joined this week by Kyle Lincoln to talk about his work with Reacting to the Past and creating games to learn about the Middle Ages.
The Assassin’s Creed Curriculum: Video Games and the Middle Ages
Of the 25 most popular video games, several take place within a medieval, or pseudo medieval, setting, such as Skyrim, World of Warcraft and the Assassin’s Creed franchise. This paper argues that rather than being distractions, video games can offer academic medievalists an exciting opportunity
Building Kenilworth Castle on Minecraft
English Heritage has reimagined Kenilworth Castle on Minecraft and will host workshops at Dover and Kenilworth castles for visitors to build their own
New video game aims to take players back to the 7th century
A new Kickstarter campaign is underway to help support the launch of Knights of Light, a historical action RPG set in Middle East.
Medieval Youtube: From Byzantine anime to best medieval video games so far this year
Here are ten Youtube videos from the last month that will inform, entertain, and delight medievalists.
Build a medieval city with new video game
Foundation is a grid-less, sprawling medieval city building simulation with a heavy focus on organic development, monument construction and resource management.
Cumans in Kingdom Come: Deliverance
A new Czech video game – Kingdom Come: Deliverance – offers a realistic medieval simulator. Billed as a serious attempt to portray medieval life and history in general it certainly provides greater visibility to the Middle Ages, especially for events and peoples eastward from Vienna. However, it also features Cuman warriors in the role of the token bad guys, and in doing so miss an opportunity to present this people and their medieval history accurately.
New game, Kingdom Come: Deliverance, explores life in medieval Bohemia
Released on 13 February, Kingdom Come: Deliverance is an action role-playing game set in the early fifteenth-century Holy Roman Empire that has striven for historically accurate and highly detailed content.
New game allows students to explore the art of 15th and 16th century Florence
A new course centered around a video game was launched this fall at Texas A&M University. The course uses the video game ARTé: Mecenas, in which students are transported to the 15th and 16th centuries to commission works of art as a Medici banker.
The quest for medievalism in ‘The Witcher 3’
This study seeks to investigate the medieval thematic in computer gaming and pursue what historical elements that persist through this relatively new medium.
Orientalism in Assassin’s Creed
On first glance Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed from 2007, the first of a long and popular series, presents itself as yet another example of Orientalism in video games
Semi-fictionalized History as Teaching Aids: Opportunities for learning history in Assassin’s Creed II as a digital game and novel
This study is a hermeneutic content analysis of both a digital video game, in this case Assassin’s Creed II, and the written story based on that game, Assassin’s Creed Renaissance.
‘Nothing is true, everything is permitted’: The Portrayal of the Nizari Isma’ilis in the Assassin’s Creed Game Series
Ubisoft’s Assassin’s Creed does a remarkable – though not flawless – job in presenting a well-balanced game narrative, which incorporates not only a historically justified representation of the Nizari Isma’ilis, but also implicitly corrects one of the most famous Western legends about the so-called ‘Assassins’
Gaming history: computer and video games as historical scholarship
The video game offers far greater potential for the creation and presentation of history than any other entertainment or interactive media.
Book Review: Assassin’s Creed: Trial by Fire
By Danièle Cybulskie Assassin’s Creed: Trial by Fire, a compilation of the first five comic books in the new Assassin’s Creed series, comes…
Medieval Oslo recreated on Minecraft
A new Youtube video is showing the results of a project by history students at the University of Oslo where they recreate how a…