Playing at War : Identity and Memory in Civil War Video Games / edited by Patrick A. Lewis and James Hill Welborn III.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Lewis, Patrick A., 1984- editor.

Welborn, James Hill, III, editor.

Series:

American wars and popular culture.

American Wars and Popular Culture Series

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

War video games--United States.

War video games.

Lost Cause mythology.

United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--Campaigns--Video games.

United States.

United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--Computer simulation.

United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--Historiography.

United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--Influence.

United States--In popular culture.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (383 pages)

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Baton Rouge, Louisiana : Louisiana State University Press, [2024]

Summary:

"Playing at War offers an innovative focus on Civil War video games as significant sites of memory creation, distortion, and evolution in popular culture. With fifteen essays by historians, the collection analyzes the emergence and popularity of video games that topically engage the period surrounding the American Civil War, from the earliest console games developed in the 1980s through the web-based games of the twenty-first century, including popular titles such as Red Dead Redemption 2 and War of Rights. Alongside discussions of technological capabilities and advances, as well as their impact on gameplay and content, the essays consider how these games engage with historical scholarship on the Civil War era, the degree to which video games reflect and contribute to popular understandings of the period, and how those dynamics reveal shifting conceptions of martial identity and historical memory within U.S. popular culture. Video games offer productive sites for extending the analysis of Civil War memory into the post-Confederates in the Attic era, including the political and cultural moments of Obama and Trump, where overt expressions of Lost Cause memory were challenged and removed from schools and public spaces, then embraced by new manifestations of white supremacist organizations. Edited by Patrick A. Lewis and James Hill Welborn III, Playing at War traces the drift of Civil War memory into digital spaces and gaming cultures, encouraging historians to engage more extensively with video games as important cultural media for examining how contemporary Americans interact with the nation past"-- ǂc Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Scouting the Landscape of Civil War Game Studies

Playing with Accuracy: Research Methodology and Historical Accuracy in Civil War Video Games / Kathleen Logothetis Thompson

"Itching to Fight": Civil War Video Game Manuals and the Emotions of Playing at War / Katherine L. Brackett

Modeling "Clean Wars": The Civil War and Second World War in Grand Strategy Games / James Frusetta

Civil War-Based Game Modifications and Crowdsourced Historical Memory / Stephen J. Edwards and Blakeney K. Hill

Briefing on Civil War Causation and Gameplay Limitations, 1970s -1990s

Searching for Indigeneity in The Oregon Trail / John R. Legg

Interpreting Slavery through Video Games: The Story of Freedom! / Nicholas W. Sacco

Two-Bit History at 8-Bit Speed: Civil War Memory in North & South during the Resurgence of Console Gaming / James Hill Welborn III

Deployment to the Strategic Hex Grid and First-Person Shooters, 1990s -2000s

Sid Meier's Gettysburg! and Civil War Culture / Patrick A. Lewis

Party on the Hex Grid: Balancing Authenticity and Fun in Civil War Generals 2 / Christian McWhirter

The End Boss of the Union: Examining Virtual Fights for Washington, DC, in Civil War Video Games / Jacopo della Quercia and Erzsébet Fazekas

Combating Flawed Authenticity: The History Channel, A Nation Divided, and Civil War Memory / Charles R. Welsko

Next-Gen and Online Redeployment in the 2010s

Race, Slavery, and the United States Colored Troops in Ultimate General: Civil War / David Silkenat and Holly A. Pinheiro Jr.

What "Rights" Exactly? War of Rights, Education, and Civil War Memory in the Twenty-First Century / Daniel Farrell

Myth, Memory, and the Civil War's Looming Presence in Call of Juarez: Bound in Blood / Aaron M. Phillips

Slavery, the Civil War, and Memory in Red Dead Redemption 2 / Jonathan S. Jones.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on publisher supplied metadata and other sources.

Description based on print version record.

Includes index.

ISBN:

9780807183458

0807183458

9780807183465

0807183466

OCLC:

1455112703