Gamification of the Middle Ages: Educational Discourse of “Kingdom Come: Deliverance”

Abstract

The growing attention to the Middle Ages in scientific discourse (neo-medievalism, H. Bull, A. C. Arend, S. J. Kobrin), in traditional media and popular culture (e.g. “The Last Kingdom” television series) in turn, led to a widespread representation of medieval theme in digital new media and virtual reality of modern video games. The paper investigates the gamification of the Middle Ages on the example of one of the most historically accurate video games, “Kingdom Come: Deliverance” (KCD). This role-playing game with its careful attention to historical heritage can be an educational game tutorial on medieval history (in the setting of the medieval Kingdom of Bohemia). KCD represents period-accurate society, politics and religion, as well as weapons, clothing, combat techniques, and architecture (recreated with the assistance of architects and historians), historical events, characters and immersive gameplay. The medieval history, boring for some students, takes on fascinating forms of a role-playing video game. The virtual world of KCD can help solve the problem of student motivation and “involvement” (E. Goffman). The emphasis, in this case, is not on the formal academic extrinsic motivation, but on the intrinsic motivation (A. Marczewski) and key drivers for motivation (Y.-K. Chou), provided by the detailed, and historically accurate virtual medieval world of KCD, both at the ludological (gameplay) and narratological (historical plot) levels. This allows us to speak of KCD, as, in fact, gamification of the Middle Ages. In terms of methodology, the study uses the actual models and theories of gamification (Y.-K. Chou, A. Marczewski, S. Deterding, R. Bartle), the dichotomy of ludology and narratology (G. Frasca, J. Juul), the non-reductionist approach (I. Bogost), the concept of the “involvement” (E. Goffman), the principle of historicism and regional typology. The findings of the paper can be useful for modern educational, historical, cultural and game studies.