Computer scenarios and simulations "reveal transformation rules and social interaction paths that were not previously thought of." (Georgantzas and Acar, 1995: 234). Simulations can draw on historical events and processes as hindsight (Schwartz, 1991: 168). When constructing a game's narrative, programmers turn, like scenario planners, to "driving forces, the forces that influence the outcome of events" (Schwartz, 1991: 106) and detailing the contextual and transactional environments (van der Heijden, 1996: 6). Like scenarios, gaming "is a story, a narrative that links historical and present events with hypothetical events taking place in the future." (van der Heijden, 1996: 213). What are Civilization III's roots in historical research?

The world of Civilization III is indebted to William McNeill's landmark book The Rise of the West (1963), which influenced a generation of historians. Unlike definitions of 'civilization' as geographical space, cultural homogeneity or developmental stage (Fernandez-Armesto, 2000: 3-4), McNeill emphasized how social change was driven by the exchange of knowledge bases and new skill-sets between different groups (McNeill, 1990). But he later re-evaluated his definition: "The book is flawed simply because it assumes that discernibly separate civilizations were the autonomous social entities whose interactions defined history on a global scale." (McNeill, 1990: 7-8).

For Robert Wright, the problem was that we viewed unfolding civilizations through a zoom lens rather than long focus: "As the centuries fly by, civilizations may come and go, but civilization flourishes, growing in scope and complexity." (Wright, 2000: 108). Wright's insight explains why God games remain an attractive genre: "Time can be sped up or slowed down at will, and interactions of data over time can be readily visualised." (Poole, 2000: 48-49). The flexibility of this time-sense underpins our collective social imaging of possible, probable and preferable futures. And we also judge the prospects of a civilization "by the confidence with which it builds for the future." (Fernandez-Armesto, 2000: 442).

Its open-ended game-play and the abilities to play different civilizations against up to fifteen AI opponents, or more in "Play the World" (the on-line multiplayer version), redeems Civilization III from the narrow focus on the 'European Miracle' (Wright, 2000: 156) and classical Judeo-Christian civilization (Clarke, 1969; Fernandez-Armesto, 2000: 8-9). The game becomes a tool for alternate scenarios and stimulating counterfactual thinking, "the domain of Hollywood science fiction films and speculative novels." (Ferguson, 1997: 2-3). If used in a scenarios workshop, Civilization III becomes a brainstorming tool for the historical analysis of key variables (van der Heijden, 1996: 138, 189).

Through customizing the game's intelligence agents (which track resource flows, cultural evolution and population growth) and the Game Editor (which defines the simulation world), the player can experiment with different thinking styles, from conditionals and counterfactuals to theoretical speculations and predictive hypotheses (Bell, vol. 1, 1999: 179). The flexibility of Civilization III's environment counteracts the criticism of alternative scenarios--"that there is no limit to the number which we can consider"--by becoming an intelligence augmentation tool that challenges prevailing thinking (Ferguson, 1997: 83).

While geopolitical analysts currently emphasize the threat to Western culture of the Sinic and Islam civilizations (Huntington, 1996), Civilization III's world lies somewhere between Fernand Braudel and Immanuel Wallestein in suggesting that this scenario did not have to eventuate (Galtung and Inayatullah, 1997: 169). One recent science fiction novel (Robinson, 2002) depicts a world where Judeo-Christian Europe did not come to pass, but was surpassed by Sinic and Islam civilizations (Wright, 2000: 189). Games like Civilization III, like popular media and speculative fiction, may therefore have a role in mediating a critical barrier of the 21st century: our socially-constructed values and stereotypes of the Other.

The Birth of Dynamical Historiography

The ability of God games to manipulate time, stimulate counterfactual thinking and augment our multiple intelligences has occurred in the midst of a tectonic shift within historiography.

The pre-World War II era was largely defined by Oswald Spengler's neobiological rise-fall and Arnold Toynbee's comparative model (Fernandez-Armesto, 2000: 10-11). During the Cold War, historiography became a battleground between rival theorists--notably Samuel P. Huntington, Eric Hobsbawm and Fernand Braudel--for the 'hearts and minds' of the populace. The term civilization became a propaganda weapon (Fernandez-Armesto, 2000: 2) that defined the economic system, class structure, division of labour and historical systems most favourable to its proponents. Lay explanations defined civilizations in terms of literacy or having reached the level of nation-states (Wright, 2000: 92, 93). The post-Cold War period has witnessed the rise-and-fall of postmodern cultural relativists, the emergence of critical realism, and at least five conflicting "pop" applications of historiography to current geopolitical problems. Socio-biology has prompted some scholars to define civilizations by their human adaptiveness to natural ecosystems and environmental contingencies (Fernandez-Armesto, 2000: 24-25).

The most promising new school of historiography to emerge may be dynamical historiography. Niall Ferguson dubs this school 'chaostory': "a chaotic approach to history." (Ferguson, 1997: 89). Ralph Abraham defines dynamical historiography as "the application of dynamical systems concepts and models to history," and observes that "social evolution is a dynamic process: cultures are born in profusion, develop variously, submit to selection processes, and die." (Abraham, 1994: 8). Manuel De Landa acknowledges the influence of Ilya Prigogine (thermodynamics) and Arthur Iberall (physics) on chaos historians (De Landa, 1997: 14-15; Eisler, 1987: 129). This new approach came into vogue with breakthroughs in abstract mathematical models, computer simulations, and evocative computer graphics (Abraham, 1994: 59). It may also be a bulwark against determinist theories of history, which become powerful "when people believe in them and believe themselves to be in their grip." (Ferguson, 1997: 88).