10 Tips I Use To Enjoy Historical Video Games the Most

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Introduction

I’ve been wanting to write this article for a long time. At Firaxis, we believe history and video games are a perfect match – they just naturally go together. There’s a huge appetite for historical games, and the genre continues to be popular, as seen with recent hits like Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 and Europa Universalis 5, both of which were bestsellers in 2025. I’m a big fan myself, and that’s actually why this website exists.

After my list of 10 common historical myths proved popular, and drawing on over 25 years of playing history-based video games, I’ve put together 10 tips to help you get the most out of the genre.

10 – Learn A Little Bit Of Real History First

If you want to truly lose yourself in great historical games, it helps to have some background knowledge of the period. While games can certainly teach you history, understanding the context beforehand will make the experience much richer. You don’t need to become a history expert – just a general understanding of the key events, people, and places will do wonders. Knowing about things like military technology, strategies, and the different groups involved will make the game feel more authentic and rewarding.

9 – Learn About Geography

History isn’t just about dates and events; it happened in real places. It’s easy to forget that historians sometimes overlook this simple fact! And just like history, every video game takes place somewhere physical, whether it’s a whole country, a small town, a forest, or even a battlefield. To really get the most out of historical games, it’s important to understand how geography impacted things like resources, populations, economies, and even the outcomes of wars. Understanding these geographical influences can help you develop better strategies and improve your chances of winning.

8 – Accept Historical Inaccuracies

Video games can never perfectly recreate the past, and there are several reasons why. Primarily, our historical records are incomplete. For most of history, we only have small fragments of information about what life was like, how things happened, and what people felt. This uncertainty increases the further back in time we go. While we have extensive documentation for events like World War II – a popular setting for games, with accounts from those who lived through it – the same isn’t true for earlier periods. For example, very few ships remain from the age of sail, and our understanding of the medieval period is even more fragmented and incomplete.

Games are welcome to strive for historical accuracy, and often do. However, it’s important to remember they are, first and foremost, games. Europa Universalis V isn’t flawless, but it effectively simulates complex factors like population changes and their effects on government and the economy. Graviteam Tactics: Mius Front, even with its imperfections, remains one of the best WWII games and powerfully illustrates the immense scale and brutal realities of fighting on the Eastern Front. Rome: Total War, while not a perfectly realistic portrayal of Roman politics, introduced many people to Roman history in a way no book or film had before. Even Battlefield 1, despite its inaccuracies, is valuable for the attention it brings to the era.

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2026-02-20 15:44