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Classical Antiquity in Video Games

One of the most innovative and promising areas of research in the field of classical reception is the study of historical video games, specifically those related to the ancient world. The scholarly approach to this kind of video game is part of so-called Games Studies, which emerged in the 1990s as an integral part of the more generic and interdisciplinary Media Studies. The book under review, edited by Rollinger, is the latest example of work published within this suggestive field of investigation. It is true that the study of historical video games has considerably increased in the last decade. However, it is an area that is just beginning to take its first steps, so the body of scholarly output concerning this topic is hardly significant (according to Rollinger, ‘the total scholarly output on ancient history in video games is less than twenty articles or book chapters and a single monograph’ [p. 5]). This perhaps explains why it has not yet received the attention of ‘serious’ historiography (this appears to be the case either because most traditional historians consider ‘unserious’ everything that has a playful bias or because, as Rollinger says, classicists and historians ‘frown on what might be considered . . . base, common and popular’ [p. 4]). Classicists and ancient historians usually ignore this developing field or look on with indifference. (For this reason, it is difficult to find scholarly papers on the subject in specialised journals on the ancient world. An important part of the bibliography produced in recent years has to be searched either in new journals, normally online publications, or in more informal venues, such as web pages, blogs or even in videos published on a YouTube channel.) Nevertheless, it deserves further consideration for many different reasons. First, its ever-growing popularity: titles such as Age of Empires, God of War and Assassin’s Creed have sold several millions of copies. Second, these games are interactive, which allows us not only to re-enact history, but even to ‘live’ it. Finally, their own narrative is founded on topics that have become part of the popular collective imagination. In the same way, many scholars have seen improved teaching and learning possibilities in this genre of video games, as a complementary or alternative way of bringing ancient history closer to students, many of whom dislike studying this subject because it is still excessively dependent on textbooks and on memory-based learning. This book has come into being thanks to the express support of the editors of the Imagines series, F. Carlà-Uhink and M. Lindner. Its declared purpose is to stimulate