Playing the Middle Ages: Pitfalls and Potential in Modern Games

The Middle Ages have provided rich source material for physical and digital games from Dungeons and Dragons to Assassin’s Creed. This volume addresses the many ways in which different formats and genre of games represent the period. It considers the restrictions placed on these representations by the mechanical and gameplay requirements of the medium and by audience expectations of these products and the period, highlighting innovative attempts to overcome these limitations through game design and play. Playing the Middle Ages considers a number of important and timely issues within the field including: one, the connection between medieval games and political nationalistic rhetoric; two, trends in the presentation of religion, warfare and other aspects of medieval society and their connection to modern culture; three, the problematic representations of race; and four, the place of gender and sexuality within these games and the broader gaming community. The book draws on the experience of a wide-ranging and international group of academics across disciplines and from games designers. Through this combination of expertise, it provides a unique perspective on the representation of the Middle Ages in modern games and drives key discussions in the fields of history and game design.

Robert Houghton is Senior Lecturer in Early Medieval History at University of Winchester, UK. He is the editor of Playing the Crusades (forthcoming, 2021) and Research Consultant for Paradox Interactive on the digital game Crusader Kings II. He also edits the Games column for the online magazine, The Public Medievalist.

Andrew B.R. Elliott is an independent scholar and has published a range of articles and essays on historical film, television and video games from the classical world to the present. He is the author of Remaking the Middle Ages (2010), which analyses medieval cinema, and he is the editor of Playing with the Past (2013; co-edited with Matthew Wilhelm Kapell), which examines the depiction of the past in video games, and The Return of the Epic Film (2014), which examines the return of the sword and sandals epic in the cinema. His latest book, Medievalism, Politics, and Mass Media (2017), explores the uses of the past in social media and mainstream news reporting.

Adrienne Merritt is Assistant Professor of German Studies at University of Colorado Boulder, USA.

Helen Young is Lecturer in Writing and Literature at Deakin University, Australia. She is the author of Race and Popular Fantasy Literature: Habits of Whiteness (2015) and Fantasy and Science Fiction Medievalisms: From Isaac Asimov to A Game of Thrones (2015).