 An irreverent, surprising, and fresh approach to teaching social history to secondary schoolers, American Dynasties is an immersive digital video game where players live the lives of Americans from eras past. Imagine a learning experience where students are thrust into the everyday hustle and bustle of a century or to ago. Where they find themselves enslaved in an antebellum town, or caught up in a strike in a Massachusetts textile mill, or riding the rails in the Depression. Where they’ll need to have all their wits about them to survive in these unfamiliar environments This excitement is at the heart of American Dynasties, a suite of immersive 3D first-person computer games that conveys the vibrancy of American history to secondary-school students. Each game portrays an important moment in U.S. history – such as the runup to the Civil War in 1855, the riots around the Stamp Act in 1765, or New England labor unrest of the early 1900s – and allows players to assume the roles of a diverse cast of characters, each representing someone from a different economic, racial or ethnic background living at that time. In each role, players face challenges and decisions that their character might have faced, and see the consequences. As they journey through a day in their character’s life, players will face difficult choices, moments of joy and sadness, exciting adventures, and plenty of colorful incidental characters to keep them company American Dynasties is tightly aligned with secondary school state and national history standards. To find out about whether your computer can play our Game Prototype, please contact us at dynasties@cnam.com. American Dynasties has been developed with support from a grant from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
 
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