History & Video Games

By: KIV Gaming

As a young boy I was absolutely enthralled with video games. My parents were constantly on my case ushering phrases such as “you spend to much time in front of that screen” or “why don’t you go outside and play”. My parents understood my level of my passion but could not understand this “Gaming World” that I was such a part of. At this age I would never considered that video games would shape my career choices as an adult. Fast forward to my grade 7 class and my teacher Mr. Black. This was also one of my most influencial years within the school system in terms of a teachers influence on myself. A little background on Mr. Black was that he had a Masters degree in history from a credited university and shared that passion with his students. Before this time I always had an interest in history and had recently been playing Rome Total War for my Dell PC. ¹ . This along with the influence of Mr. Black would spur me into persueing history further within the secondary school system later on.

At the end of the school year during finals time there was a mandatory speech contest that the school I attended used as a way for students to practice their writing skills. Everyone in my class wrote on topics such as “The Negative Effects of Cigarettes & Alcohol” and “How many hours of sleep should you get in a night” etc. I however wrote on Hannibal Barca of Carthage and The Hannibalic War against the Roman Empire in roughly 218 BC. ² I was granted passage into the final round of the contest in which the student were required to read his/her speech infront of the entire grade. (a horifyng experience for myself at the time). Needless to say I did not come in first due to my lack of performance infront of a crowd.The influence of both the Total War series as well as Mr. Black himself started the first chapter in my history career.

I then spent the next 5 years finishing up grade 8 as well as the surviving a small town highschool system taking as many history and political science courses that I could get my hands on. As I continued my schooling so to did the Creative Assembly team on their Total War product line with titles such as Medieval II: Total War, Empire: Total War, Napoleon: Total War and Shogun II: Total War. This not only spurred by video game addiction but also a small portion of my historical lust for knowledge. My schooling in history and Creative Assmblies’ Total War line continued to provide historical inspiration so that I could continue my own research on both my own time and within the class room.

When I originally started this adventure of video games and history I had done it for fun and my own personal interest. Fast forward to today and I have graduated with a Honours degree in History and currently work at a museum in historical preservation and restoration. Guess what…. I still play Total War games! Although their most recent title Total War: WARHAMMER ³ is not in line with historical fact it definately fills my other love …. Fantasy! :P

In conclusion if I can give any advice to anyone out there looking to follow their passions. It will all work out in the end even if it doesn’t take the path you likely expected. We cannot move forward unless we learn from the mistakes of the past and what better time to relax and unwind than gaming! I also reccommend any Total War game if you enjoy history (or most recently fantasy) based strategy games with an overarching campaign map and large scale in-engine battles! ⁴

Thanks for reading and I hope you all enjoyed!

P.S These are my own personal ideas and opinions

KIV

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