I am, too, to an extent. I like the idea of history, and I enjoy learning about history, but I don’t necessarily want to spend money to experience real history. I want a fantasized, rose-colored glasses version of history, where women weren’t treated as lesser - at least not to the extent they were, in reality.
One where it is possible for a poor, peasant girl to earn her way to, say, being a Knight of the Kingdom, without being, like, burned at the stake for being a witch.
Accurate history is great for documentaries and biographies and textbooks. I want historical fiction in a game!
I think in the end it all comes down to finding the right balance between action and world building/education/etc.
To go by The Silmarillion example I’ve think Tolkien spent too much time with describing stuff before something would actually happen. That can get boring to say it plainly. About Historical CoGs/HGs maybe a bit more fleshing out with descriptions or spending more time on scenes before moving on to the next one wouldn’t hurt to avoid making it seem rushed. Okay actually I’m not really sure about this one but it’s still a fact that many of the authors who decide to write these don’t seem like they would 100%ly committed to it. Like they lose the patience at some point and just want to get it done as soon as possible.
I should also point out there is an entire series of Interactive Fiction which focuses on teaching younger people history and showing numerous perspectives across multiple times - You Choose Interactive History. So there’s scope from things like things to provide plenty of inspiration for stories set in the past.
And whilst it’s from a while back Gamebooks have also successfully catered to historical audiences with the Real Life Gamebooks which featured titles set in the French Revolution, Battle of Hastings, American Revolution and more.
BTW I do have a question as an Englishman for American audiences… do you tend to find stories set outside familiar American historical events from the last 250 years or so harder to enjoy? I ask because in the UK I suppose we might have had a broader History program at Primary - we did all three classical civilizations (Egypt, Greece and Rome), Vikings, the History of Writing, Tudors, Victorians and the world since the 1930’s. Though to be fair we didn’t trend much into non Ancient world history until Secondary with Russian and American History. I just was curious what sorts of things Americans tend to learn in History that isn’t specifically American History?
I would say I don’t have a problem enjoying stories set outside of American history, but my guess is that I am decidedly in the minority on that (at least among the general American population, not necessarily the people on this forum).
From what I remember from public school, history before the American colonies was packed into one year, so you can imagine how rushed each topic would be.
What I’ve found is that people are not really looking to get out of their comfort zones when it comes to entertainment, and I think that extends to interactive fiction. My guess is a story about the American Civil War would do really well in the US, while one about the War of the Roses or Oliver Cromwell would not, no matter the differences in quality.
This is part of what I meant what I said that the historical settings aren’t being used to their full potential. Literally everything the author needs – language, culture, historical events – are already there to be used, but instead it feels like only the surface of a setting is used without the ideas being fully explored.
To keep using Tolkien as an example, it’d be like if the setting was simply “the elves and dwarves don’t like each other” vs “the elves and dwarves don’t like each other, and don’t forget that Galadriel denied one of the greatest elves a strand of her hair three times, and also don’t forget that only the elves are allowed/feel called to sail west”… which would be a better story for Gimli and Legolas’ friendship? Sure, both are heartwarming in how they get over their races’ dislike for each other, but the latter explores Gimli’s character through his admiration of Galadriel (and vice versa since she grants his request), Legolas’ character in how he denies the call to Valinor until Gimli goes with him, and shows even more how the relationship between elves and dwarves has been mended. And that’s more interesting than just Gimli and Legolas becoming friends.
That’s interesting! I think because in my case I never did Stuarts in school we didn’t tackle much of the ‘New World’ stuff, though I assume we did Christopher Columbus and Sir Francis Drake, I know we tackled the Renaissance and Michelangelo with the Sistine Chapel…
I think here in the UK we don’t put as much issue on our Civil War as Americans do, one could probably do a story centred around a Royalist Cavalier and make him seem heroic and justified (if probably a tad arrogant) than a Confederate Soldier (who is probably following orders and desires to keep his way of life but you know, slavery and racism is what many British people would think of first, even if they don’t know Britain was perfectly happy recognising the CSA as its own country at the time). And as someone from an Irish background I have VERY particular opinions about Mister Cromwell…
Huh. I’m also American, and I would’ve guessed the opposite — Anglophilia is real, and dealing with the Civil War seems like it would be fraught af for Americans.
My experience is that we Americans mostly do not study U.S. History. Like, the average American knows sweet fuck-all about, for instance, the War of 1812. Which was kiiind of a big deal. American history tends to focus on either the Revolutionary War or the Civil War, with a smattering of colonial history, like Jamestown forward, and probably not enough attention on the first half of the 19thC, or the first half of the 20thC.
And the rest of “history” tends to be little dips into European history, (specifically centered on the UK) from the 1500s forward. Little attention paid to central European conflicts, the Napoleonic wars, maybe you spend a little time on the French Revolution. But I learned next to nothing in school about WWI, too much of WWII focused on the European theater and the Holocaust (and I say this as someone with literally an entire bookshelf devoted to the subject). So in short: at least for me I’m not over-interested in American history and am happy to spend time in other lands.
I agree. Any fiction about American history isn’t going to do as well as Anglo stuff–witness The Tudors, The Other Boleyn Girl, Wolf Hall, etc etc etc.
Mine was completely different! I learned so much about colonial America, the colonies, and state history.
The thing is, the education for the country is decided minimally by the federal government, moderately by the state government, and mostly by the county/township/parish.
I grew up in Fairfax, Virginia, which arguably has the best school district in the country, so ymmv.
Speak for yourself! I think IF is actually a great and unexplored medium to use for history lessons, but that’s a discussion for another time…
I think for the context of this conversation I agree with the sentiment, though. The biggest priority of a historic fiction story should be entertainment.
No, not really. There’s fascinating stories from all over time. There’s almost a whole treasure trove of untapped inspiration and settings that can be used.
I’m not sure how much older than me you are, Mary, but I think that this has improved over time. Not a whole lot, but a bit. A lot of people my age are familiar with learning about the rise of big business, the presidency of Andrew Jackson, Reconstruction, and the later 20th century from our high school history classes.
But I also changed schools a lot, so my experience is probably spottier and worse than if I’d stayed in one place. But now that you mention it, we did do a ton of state history when I lived in Alabama, circa 9th grade. I would also venture to guess that if you grow up in a “American history-dense” place, like VA/DC it’s much more likely to lead to better experiences in history class.
I went to school in both California and Virginia and it’s less about being dense with American history as it is with being taught about your local history more. In California, the people I know are much more familiar with the history of the mission system, Mexican-Californian history and relations, the Gold Rush, Oregon Trail, and the Wild West. Out east, we barely covered this stuff. Like you mentioned in your other response, though, a lot of world history is primarily Euro/Anglo-centric.
Exactly my point. My history classes, while not perfect, were incredible, and my teachers were passionate. It was cool going to Congress for school trips (for my Korean class, I went to the Korean embassy* and associated buildings and spoke with Koreign diplomats. Incredible) and stuff, so definitely living in history-rich (well, just rich, really) places can help define how good your education was.
That said, to avoid straying from the topic at hand, lol, I do think there could be a niche for American history IF, but there’s something romantic about European history. Probably because the majority of romantic, timeless classics come from Europe.
I find it interesting that many Americans don’t study as much of their own history as I thought they would. When I finally did American History in relative depth in my first year of University studying History we tackled four key times - the post Revolution years, the Civil War, the Roaring Twenties and the Civil Rights 60’s. Before that at school we only did the 20’s and Vietnam in detail, the latter as part of a Cold War module.
I assume many Americans find romanticising the Medieval Britain common, just as many Brits do with the American West.
So here’s a question I’d like to ask, then I’m stepping back for a bit to make sure other people have a chance to contribute to this conversation: at what point does historical inaccuracy for the sake of fair gameplay become a problem?
I ask this because I too like to play stories where I am allowed to be a woman and/or queer, but sometimes I get frustrated by the lack of acknowledgement of those identities, which causes the historic setting to feel like tasteless salad dressing.
But don’t take my own spotty education as law: we do study American history, and most everyone gets colonial/Rev War/Civil War, it’s just the curriculum is extremely variable, as @ashestoashes018 and @RedRoses point out. I didn’t learn much about western American history until I moved west and started doing research on my Jewish ancestors who settled in Kansas in the 1860s.
