American "Civilization" - Contact and Post-Contact American and Native American Culture in Sid Meier's Civilization

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "(Re)Presenting the Past: Archaeological Influences on Historical Narratives in Video Games" , at the 2022 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

Civilization is a turn-based strategy game in which players lead a civilization over the course of millennia, developing technology, exploring and conquering lands and nations, and practicing diplomacy and trade. There have been a total of six iterations, from Civilization I in 1991, to Civilization VI in 2016. The series is also rightfully criticized for highlighting and glorifying imperialism and settler colonialism. This paper will seek to explore the phenomenon of settler colonialism in the Civilization series, by exploring game dynamics through a reimaging of the game's format. We will focus on rectifying the depictions and methods of play for Contact and post-Contact North American cultures in the game, utilizing our collective expertise in game design, archaeology, and Indigenous cultures. We will try to answer the question of whether a version which is more archaeologically and culturally accurate can be created without affecting the underlying mechanics of the game.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• (Re)Presenting the Past: Archaeological Influences on Historical Narratives in Video Games   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2022

Keywords

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology