Gaming the Battle of Alesia: a lesson in ethics

Friday 6 June 2025

In this blog, UG student Kate Nolting discusses what she has learnt about Applied Classics by designing an interactive RPG (role-playing game) based on ancient warfare, to teach lessons about ethics and political ideologies in the 21st-century classroom.

As a subject, Classics has occupied a troubling space for several generations, often promoting questionable ideologies and attracting engagement from groups with controversial and antiquated beliefs. In the module Classics for the Modern World, we began by considering the issues that Classics must address if it is to remain relevant within academia. We examined scholars who link the discipline’s decline to its elitist, misogynist, and racist associations. One of the most impactful voices on the subject was classicist Dan-el Padilla Peralta, who argues that “Classics has been instrumental to the invention of ‘whiteness’ and its continued domination”.[i] His criticism of the discipline of Classics called for a change in the mindset of Classical scholars, advocating for greater inclusion of Black communities who have been historically erased as both contributors to and subjects within Classical history.[ii] Similarly, Mary Beard’s book Confronting the Classics explores how the field of Classics can endure given that it “often acts as a convenient alibi for a whole range of cultural and political sins”.[iii] She considers the probable causes of its decline as a subject of study, examining its presentation, reception, audiences and potential reinterpretation in order to ensure its relevance to the modern world. Of all the voices we considered, Donna Zuckerberg’s indictment of misogyny in Classics in her book Not All Dead White Men had the most significant impact on me. Her book tackles the pervasive misogyny in online spaces, particularly among the extensive “Red Pill” groups and how their alt-right ideology perverts Classical texts to legitimize their deeply repressive worldviews.[iv] Her argument that ancient literature is being selectively interpreted to support extremist agenda forced me to question the reception of Classics and begin considering how it might be studied in ways which support modern issues without it being presented piecemeal or ideologically weaponized. 

 These issues ultimately shaped the direction of my team’s Applied Classsics project. Due to our shared interest in modern politics, my group formed the goal of combatting alt-right radicalization through engagement with antiquity. We decided that game design would be a strong methodology through which we could convey the value of our project to our chosen demographic;[v] and we agreed to tailor our project to those most harmed by the media output of the alt-right: adolescents and young adults. Flowing from this idea, I landed on designing a game based on the Battle of Alesia which suited adolescents between ages 13 and 16, and utilized structural and content elements based on the qualities of video and board games played by that age group. We decided that role play games, or RPGS, suited this demographic, and so created a formula that adhered to this style, while being able to present issues under the alt-right umbrella. These included misogyny, white supremacy, racism, and, for my game, war glorification. While I did not originally set out to create a resource with broader potential beyond the project requirements, further consideration of the pervasive elitism in the study of Classics led me to consider its use in additional areas. For that reason, the game I designed as part of the overall project became formatted for use in classrooms, maintaining a low age rating, shorter run time, and a set up consistent with the needs of schoolteachers with limited prep time.[vi]  

Re-Visualising War via RPGs

Early in the project, we chose RPGs due to their open-ended and conversational style, which encourages active participation and engagement from players.[vii] As suggested by my project partner, George Simons, we needed to bear in mind the difference between informing and reforming our players, not espousing certain political or moral stances directly ourselves but rather allowing them to draw their own conclusions based on the content of our games. The role play design encourages lots of player initiative, allowing players to engage with issues as they arise and think through the cause and effects of their decision without our intervention. In this way, we were able to present the reality of particular situations, such as the horrors of the war or the struggles of minorities, without directly mentioning our goal of combatting harmful ideology and potentially ostracizing our target audience. 

I began designing my personal game immediately following some classroom discussion of war and peace in antiquity, drawing on the Visualising War project. I was interested in the dynamic between ancient warfare and modern industries which commercialize violence for financial gain at the expense of sensitivity to such topics (such as ancient warfare magazines). I felt that a game which sought to explore the inverse message, glorifying peace and thereby questioning the popularity of violent games, would be an apt response to this issue. Our class’s discussion of the US Capital riots and the militarization of the American youth were additionally impactful and directly related to my personal experience as an American citizen.[viii] From a very young age, my country’s appropriation of violence and militarization has shaped my worldview and greatly desensitized me to the real struggles of those affected by conflict. I felt based on these discussions that shaping my game to target the issue of glorifying war in the media would be appropriate.

Our study of ancient and modern migration/forced displacement further encouraged me in this, since it highlighted the severe impact of political and social instability on individuals, rather than on governments and institutions. I took a specific interest in KCL’s Letters of Refuge project, as their program revealed the diverse struggles of the refugees entering the UK.[ix] Their bottom-up approach seemed to allow for the humanization of those suffering on account of displacement, and I was struck by the impact this methodology had on their ability to both call for action and maintain respect for those whose real experiences were being displayed.[x] In response, I felt that the inclusion of personal accounts of refugee experiences in my game would produce a greater impact and would help with creating accurate representation. 

My research underlined the importance of presenting war responsibly. Without being inaccurate to the real events of my chosen battle, I wanted to present a war whose severity and loss would bring players out of the game mindset and help them consider their attitude towards media’s depiction of violence. On the other hand, I felt it necessary to acknowledge the values of ancient Roman people, whose culture celebrated war as an honourable pursuit, and so I determined to present the event with both sides represented, using direct quotes from both modern accounts of violence and the ancient texts recording the events of the battle.

My game was inspired by the Battle of Alesia, with Caesar’s The Gallic War serving as the primary source.[xi] I chose this battle not only because its famously cinematic and dramatic nature adapts well as a game, but also due to Caesar’s distinctive narrative style in recounting the story. I am particularly interested in the ways in which alt-right media portray and distort events, influencing their audiences viewpoints and even behaviours. This issue has become especially pronounced since the election of Donald Trump, with biased reports emerging from across the political spectrum, leaving few sources that can be considered reliable for comprehensive news. In a similar manner, Caesar’s account of The Gallic War appears to serve a propagandistic function, shaping public perception in his favour. His narrative paints a glorifying depiction of himself as a great, noble conqueror.[xii] One notable description highlights his appearance and the heroic figure he makes on the battlefield, reading, “(Caesar was) known by the colour of his cloak, which it was his habit to wear in action as a distinguishing mark” as he is depicted fighting courageously in the heart of the conflict.[xiii] To represent this theme within the gameplay, I wrote a core script for the game’s narrator, who speaks as Caesar and quotes directly from the primary text. These excerpts are interwoven with catchphrases and tweets from alt-right politicians. A strong example of this dynamic occurs at the onset of the game, in which the narrator describes the setting. The script instructs the narrator to read the following excerpt from the Gallic Wars: 

“The actual stronghold of Alesia is set on top of a hill, in a very lofty situation, apparently impregnable save by blockade. The bases of the hill are washed on two separate sides by rivers. Before the town a plain extends for a length of about three miles; on all the other sides there are hills surrounding the town at a short distance, and equal to it in height. Under the wall, on the side which looks eastward, the forces of the Gauls are entirely occupying all this intervening space, and have made in front a ditch and a rough wall six feet high”[xiv]

However, immediately after the narrator’s description, the script transitions into a series of paraphrased statements originally made by the Trump administration. In these, derogatory references to the Mexican population, where they are referred to as criminals and rapists, are substituted with similar language directed at the Gauls, who are labelled as barbarians and foreigners, as well as other pejorative terms.[xv] This parallel carries into the next round of the game, in which the Roman army decides to build a wall to starve out the soldiers in Alesia. During this sequence, tweets referencing the US-Mexico border wall are inserted, further emphasizing the connection between Caesar’s dehumanization of the Gauls used to justify his actions and advance his political agenda and the way alt-right media weaponizes rhetoric to legitimize similar forms of marginalization and violence.[xvi]

Based on feedback from my teammates after the first trial run, the dialogue aspects were determined to be the strongest and therefore became the focus of the game in later development and rewriting. The earliest version of the game saw a combat-focused storyline, in which players designed characters as members of Caesar’s army, choosing their rank, backstory, and some fun facts which became interwoven into game play. However, players and observers noted that the combat sequences were fun but failed to convey the importance of peace and the project’s goal of combatting the alt-right’s glorification of violence in the media. Later versions of the game were therefore titled “Caesar’s War Room” and used that context to position players as external observers rather than direct participants in combat. While core sequences remained unchanged, in later trials, this shift removed the players’ focus on personal survival and efforts to avoid battle, since they were no longer personally affected by the violence. Instead, players made decisions with more emphasis on “winning”, which increased their tendencies toward violent or severe actions. For this reason, the script also developed to involve detailed descriptions of the aftermath of their decisions, most impactfully depictions of the experiences of the innocent victims who were harmed by the players decisions. 

Visualising War’s Victims

Based on the KCL Letters of Refuge project, I felt that accounts from the victims of political instability would more directly speak to the horrors of war than the ancient texts or data, and therefore included a round of game play which involved depictions of the death of ancient civilians with quotes from modern victims of war.[xvii] The event which most closely aligned with this idea in the Gallic War involves the civilians of Alesia being cast out from their own city by the Gallic tribes, whom they had protected from Caesar’s army at the cost of their own safety.[xviii] Vercingetorix, the general of the Gauls, displaces them, leaving them in the 3-mile space between the stronghold of Alesia and the wall constructed by Caesar’s army, designed to starve out those dwelling in the hilltop town. These civilians, most of whom were women and children, approached Caesar’s wall and requested passage. According to the account, Caesar refused them, and they starved between the walls of the stronghold and the surrounding army. The actual sequence in The Gallic War consists of 3 sentences, stating: 

The Mandubii, whose town had received them, were compelled to leave it with wives and children. When they reached the Roman lines they begged with tears and abject prayers to be received as slaves and helped with food. But Caesar posted sentries on the rampart and prevented their admission.

The narrator, speaking as the voice of Caesar, acknowledges the brevity of this sequence within the game script, justifying it as a deliberate tactic in preserve a favourable public image despite the brutality of his actions. During gameplay, players are offered the chance to decide whether to return the innocents to Vercingetorix, kill them, set them free, or enslave them. The narrator notes that each option carries certain consequences (and some indeed break the laws of modern warfare). For example, freeing them allows a spy to slip through the Roman defences and bring reinforcements to the Gauls. As a result of this chain reaction, players in the trial runs consistently avoided setting the innocents free, noting that doing so would almost certainly ensure their defeat. The most commonly chosen option was to send the civilians back to Vercingetorix, which is consistent with the real course of events. Unfortunately, this option, both historically and in the game, leads to the death of the civilians, who are denied re-entry into Alesia and left to starve. In rounds where players came to this decision, the narrator is instructed in the script to read accounts of the starvation of the Palestinian population in 2024, reported by the Human Rights Watch.[xix] The accounts come from the Kamal Adwan hospital, which at the time cared for multiple children affected by food and water shortages. These include specific details, such as the condition of a newborn whose “limbs became very cold and…was breathing very slowly” and a mother who had recently given birth and was subsisting solely on legumes and canned food. In addition to these real accounts, players were clued into the reality of this choice: that the decision to either set the women and children free or cause them harm would both result in the spy getting through the walls to call reinforcements. Historically, the Gauls secured reinforcements without the civilians being set free, keeping this result accurate to the account.[xx] 

Most rounds of gameplay involved these cause-and-effect actions, where choices were presented with their proposed outcomes and players chose whichever option they deemed fit. The most important aspect of this configuration, however, was that the goals of the game and the route to winning was never established, but players were encouraged to determine for themselves what victory looks like. Throughout the game, the narrator offers incentives to choose more severe or violent options, serving as a commentary on how cultural and political climates can shape perception of morality in warfare.  However, some players expressed a willingness to engage even without such prompting. 

All participants in the trial runs signed consent forms allowing me to discuss their gameplay, with the option to withdraw any quotes, data, or recordings at any time before, during, or after participation. My teammate, Isabelle Meadows-Gibb, developed a set of pre- and post-game questionnaires to assess each players political affiliation, media consumption habits, and reaction to the game content. Based on this data, we were able to note a trend in players with right-leaning political ideology regarding their increased willingness to engage with the violent or extreme aspects of the combat sequences. One particularly jarring example occurred during an early trial, when players were asked how to handle the displaced citizens of Alesia. One participant suggested setting the field on fire in order to get rid of them quickly. Such responses highlight the influence of media that glorifies war and rewards aggression, reinforcing the idea that violent action is both effective and justified. 

In the game’s conclusion, the announcement of victory involves a dual award system. One award is given to the ‘Roman Victor’ or the player who achieved the highest level of honour from a Roman perception. This often meant being brutal, violent, or dying in combat. The other winner is the player who displayed the most moral reactions to war, such as attempting to save their teammates, civilians, or make peace with the Gallic tribes. This was meant to suggest a takeaway from the game, where players consider the ways they approach media, especially gaming, and question their immediate assumptions about the game’s goal and how these assumptions have formed in them. This became especially relevant in instances like the one in which a player suggested the violent murder of civilians. The participant won the award for ‘Roman Victor’, with the reasons explicitly outlined but with no comment on the morality or radical nature of their gameplay. However, they later wrote a note in their post-game questionnaire which suggested that the award felt less than honourable, given their reflection on the suffering of the innocents related by the personal accounts of those suffering from starvation in Gaza.

I had hoped this message would land with the particular age group for which the game is designed. Watching the series Adolescence recently furthered my desire to specifically produce teaching aides for combatting harmful ideologies in the media.[xxi] This 2025 TV show deals with the impact of the ‘manosphere’ on the developing worldview of adolescent boys, specifically on their views towards women. Reflection on the impact of media consumption and education in that age bracket greatly concerned me, especially knowing the ways in which Classics has been perverted to support such problematic ideologies. For this reason, I believe it is important to incorporate Classical history into curriculum in manners which promote positive impact and morality. Researching these issues further led to the reformation of my game design into a learning tool, specifically made to be incorporated into standard US curricula, hopefully for my personal use as a teacher next year.

 The resources our project team found regarding games as educational tools suggest that the use of these sorts of activities is largely rejected by teachers on account of their lack of prep time. [xxii] In order to mitigate this, the games produced include comprehensive scripts that can be read word for word, without need for research into the event or topic. For the sake of working within school periods, the game’s run time is approximately an hour, up to an hour and a half depending on the length of the debate rounds. The games begin with character building rounds, which aim to get every student involved in the conversation. Rounds from that point require unanimous or voting based decisions, which force engagement from each player. Studies included in Lucas Maxwell’s guide to RPGs in schools, Let’s Roll, suggest both of these methods as ways of initiating gameplay in order to break shyer students out of their shells.[xxiii] The game also includes allocation of specific awards or powers based on particular decisions that can be made by each player. This allows for some variety in the gameplay, which is aimed to engage with various learning styles and preferences. In addition to my personal game being designed with these elements, the structure itself is extremely formulaic, making it usable in conveying other messages and stories. 

Future-Proofing the Prototype

As with all Applied Classics projects, this design produced inherent pitfalls, most of which are related to its formulaic structure. As it can be transformed to satisfy the desires of a given curriculum, it could be reproduced to support alternative messages which do not conform to our proposed goal of combatting alt-right radicalization. I believe a potential solution to this problem also lies in the future of the project: that it becomes a copyrighted line of games produced under a corporation. In this way, we can retain the rights to the formula, preventing the adaptation of our games by those who seek to produce harmful media or glorify war. Considering the success of projects like Field \ Work and Letters of Refuge, I also believe that linking our project to an NGO may increase our ability to continue the work.[xxiv]Programs like Curriculum Resource or Art Refuge support those initiatives and protect their interest due to their aligned goals.[xxv] I would hope our team could find similar support from gaming corporations or curriculum development projects who could enable us to produce more games within the project.

Based on this semester studying Applied Classics, I believe that transforming the way in which Classics is taught is the only way to ensure its continuation as a subject of study. Considering reflections from Classicists like Dan-el Padilla Peralta, Mary Beard, or Donna Zuckerberg, it is clear that the patriarchal, elitist, and racist version of Classics that is perpetuated by its current form of presentation will cause its steady decline in relevance in present-day society. Safeguarding its study will involve presenting its culture, history, and language in such a way that it can contribute to a modern worldview.[xxvi] This does not by any stretch mean that we only present the aspects of the cultures that positively align with our morals and viewpoints, but that we educate with a focus on impact, acknowledging where ancient values were problematic and recognizing that past cultures can contribute to our understanding without a need to imitate every aspect them. While my team project did not begin with this particular aim, the continual exposure to the world of Applied Classics brought me to the conclusion that my personal design needed to support this idea. As I will be teaching ancient history and literature next year in the US, I am glad that this course has set me up well to present the languages, texts, and cultures in such a way that they support modern issues and views, ensuring that my students feel welcome to learn and enjoy the subject without fear of its associations with problematic ideologies. 

References

[i] Poser, “He Wants to save Classics from Whiteness”.

[ii] Ibid.

[iii] Beard, Confronting the Classics, 5.

[iv] Zuckerberg, 6.

[v] Sanchiz, Gimenes, and Lambert, “Learning with Board Games”, 2.

[vi] Maxwell, Let’s Roll, 15.

[vii] Maxwell, Let’s Roll, 17.

[viii] Pharos, “Capitol Terrorists”. 

[ix] KCL, “Letters of Refuge”.

[x] KCL, “Letters of Refuge”.

[xi] Caesar and Edwards, The Gallic War, 477-511.

[xii] Caesar and Edwards, The Gallic War, 479.

[xiii] Ibid, 507. 

[xiv] Ibid.

[xv] Neate, “Donald Trump”.

[xvi] Trump, “Status”. 

[xvii] KCL, “Letters of Refuge”.

[xviii] Caesar and Edwards, The Gallic War, 495.

[xix] Human Rights Watch, “Gaza”.

[xx] Caesar and Edwards, The Gallic War, 497.

[xxi] Hogan, “Unnervingly On-The-Nose”.

[xxii] Nautiyal, Silverio, and Salvador, “Let’s get on-board”, 1.

[xxiii] Maxwell, Let’s Roll, 17.

[xxiv] Landscape Decisions, “Field \ Work”. And KCL, “Letters of Refuge”. 

[xxv] UK Foundation Programme, “Curriculum Resource”. And Art Refuge, “Art Refuge”.

[xxvi] Beard, Confronting the Classics, 11.

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