Questions about “truth” in popular culture and discourse have been ever-present in recent years, but the practice of history has long been grappling with and debating what “historical truth” means or looks like, as it relates to understanding and representing the past. Like other media industries with a longer history of reimagining and writing their own histories, games routinely become sites around which (implicit or explicit) “truth” claims are made, negotiated, and contested. Critics, players, and the industry itself often do so by deploying a number of other terms, equally ambiguous and disputed in meaning: “accuracy”, “realism”, and “authenticity” being those most often used to stake or undermine particular claims (e.g. Salvati and Bullinger, 2013; Shaw, 2015; Wright, 2017; Lorber and Zimmermann, 2020).

So, when we ask questions about what it means to be “truthful” when engaging with history, what are we actually asking? What responsibility do game makers have to “tell the truth” about the pasts they seek to represent? Likewise, what responsibility do critics have when approaching these complex issues?

Ultimately, how can we navigate the complicated, but often productive ways that games relate to understandings of history while creating new opportunities for dialogue and collaboration between researchers, teachers, developers, heritage professionals, and beyond.