ARISE conference
10pm GMT (7pm BST)
10th December 2025

MGC member Jenny Cromwell will be delivering her keynote talk at the online ARISE conference (Brazil).

Abstract: Imagining Ancient Egypt in Video Games
When thinking about ancient Egypt in video games, the first games that probably come to mind for many people are Sid Meier’s Civilisation, Total War: Pharaoh, and Assassin’s Creed Origins. That is, games in which the events take place entirely in their ancient setting (or mostly, in the case of Origins) and on a scale that allows detailed depictions of Egyptian history and culture. But these aspects also occur if multiple ways in a diverse range of games that are not necessarily obvious ‘ancient Egypt games’. This talk will focus in particular on these not-ancient-Egypt games, examining the ways in which Egypt is integrated in different settings, and how it is used to construct fictional worlds. In so doing, it will analyse the ways in which Egypt is (re)imagined in a modern context, and what this reveals about contemporary understandings of its history.

(image: The Talos Principle [Croteam/Devolver, 2014])