Despite the prevalence of video games set in or inspired by classical antiquity, the medium has to date remained markedly understudied in the disciplines of classics and ancient history, with the role of women in these video games especially neglected. Women in Classical Video Games seeks to address this imbalance as the first book-length work of scholarship to examine the depiction of women in video games set in classical antiquity.
The volume surveys the history of women in these games and the range of figures presented from the 1980s to the present, alongside discussion of issues such as historical accuracy, authenticity, gender, sexuality, monstrosity, hegemony, race and ethnicity, and the use of tropes. A wide range of games of different types and modes are discussed, including platformers, strategy games , roguelikes, MOBA, action RPGs, and story-driven romance mobile games. The detailed case studies presented here form a compelling case for the indispensability of the medium to both reception studies and gender studies, and offer nuanced answers to such questions as how and why women are portrayed in the ways that they are.
Introduction (Jane Draycott, University of Glasgow, UK and Kate Cook, Durham University, UK) Part One 1. Playable Girls in Ancient Worlds: Athena (1986) Opens the Door (Dunstan Lowe, University of Kent, UK) 2. A Historical Overview of Women in Ancient-Period Video Games (Jordy Orellana Figueroa, Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen, Germany) 3. Dangerous Defaults: Demographics and Identities Within and Without Video Games (Marcie Persyn, University of Pittsburg, USA) Part Two 4. The Maiden, the Mother and the Monster: The Monstrous-Feminine in Historical and Archaeological Video Games (Dan Goad, Independent Scholar, UK) 5. Bringing Down the Divine Patriarchy through Deicide in Apotheon (2015) (Amy Norgard, Truman State University, USA) 6. Argonautic Women? Gender and Heroic Status in Rise of the Argonauts (Sophie Ngan, Durham University, UK) 7. Good Riddance: Refiguring Eurydice in Supergiant’s Hades (Kira Jones, Emory University, USA) 8. Reception and Representation of Greco-Roman Goddesses in Smite: Battleground of the Gods (Katherine Beydler, University of Michigan, USA) 9. Aphrodite, A Caricature of Female Sexuality (Olivia Ciaccia, University of Bristol, UK) Part Three 10. Violence against Women in Classical Video Games (Hannah-Marie Chidwick, University of Bristol, UK) 11. Playing Cleopatra in Assassin's Creed Origins (Jane Draycott, University of Glasgow, UK) 12. Playing Salammbô? Orientalism, Gender and Gaming with the Punic World (Andrew Dufton, University of Edinburgh, UK) 13. Kassandra’s Odyssey (Richard Cole, University of Bristol, UK) 14. 'We Do What we Must to Survive': Prostitution and Power in Assassin’s Creed Odyssey’ (Roz Tuplin, GameLondon, UK) 15. 'It’s the Most Freedom a Woman can Have': Gender, Genre and Agency in Choices: A Courtesan of Rome (Kate Cook, Durham University, UK) Notes Bibliography Index
Jane Draycott is Lecturer in Ancient History at the University of Glasgow, UK. Kate Cook is Associate Lecturer in Classics at the University of St Andrews, UK.
Reviews for Women in Classical Video Games
A sorely needed, intelligent and entertaining analysis of an understudied subject within an understudied medium. --Ross Clare, Teacher in Classics and Ancient History, University of Liverpool, UK Women in Classical Video Games is an excellent read not just for the variety of perspectives that it includes, the games that it discusses and the questions that it answers, but also because ultimately it mirrors the purpose of history itself, to document the past so that we may learn from it. By looking back at historical games with a critical eye we can begin to acknowledge and accept where we fell short and understand where, going forward, we can do better. --Historical Games Network
