10 Video Games That Taught Us Forgotten History
4. Total War Series (Real-Life Battles)
Plucking from memory one of many potential examples again, the player can pit their wits against the generals of the seldom discussed Arab-Byzantine wars of the 10th Century - between the Byzantine Empire and the Hamdanid dynasty (present day Iraq and Syria) in Total War.
It was through playing Medieval 2: Total War and recreating the Battle of Andrassos that I first learned of the concept of jihad and how Muslim forces fought to defend their lands with such ferocity against who they saw as the invading Christian empires.
Rather than engaging at the recently attacked fortress of Chrisianon, the Byzantine forces of Leo Phokas waited at the rear guard of the Arab forces and their Prince Sayf al-Dawla.
The surprise attack on the retreating force was a slaughter that devastated Sayf al-Dawla's armies – a defeat in which the Hamdanid dynasty never truly recovered and eventually resulted in control of the region dividing between the Byzantine Empire and the caliphate of Egypt.