1. Method & Source Hygiene

The Assassin’s Creed Discovery Tours (Origins, Odyssey, Valhalla) provide narrative-free spaces where learners can explore reconstructed environments without combat. However, these reconstructions are not peer-reviewed textbooks — they are game art. To turn them into responsible teaching tools, we must establish clear rules:

Game vs. History Mapping

Educators can overlay Ubisoft’s visual storytelling with verified reference material. For example:

• In-game Alexandria Library → cross-reference with archaeological findings and Plutarch’s accounts.
• Roman naval ships in Odyssey → compare with trireme remains and maritime museum collections.
• Viking longhouses in Valhalla → align with excavations at Borg (Lofoten, Norway).

Citation Discipline

All supporting material should be cited using a simplified format suitable for classrooms:

• Book: Author, Title, Year, Publisher.
• Journal: Author, “Article Title,” Journal, Volume, Year.
• Museum: Institution, Object ID, Catalogue Link.

2. The City: Markets, Ports, and Power

Cities in Assassin’s Creed Discovery Tours serve as learning sandboxes. Use them to teach urban form (street grids, districts), political economy (who controls what and why), and logistics (how goods, taxes, and people move). This section gives you ready-to-run walkthroughs, classroom activities, and “fact-card” anchors you can reuse across lessons.

A. Urban Grammar

• Districts: administrative core, religious precincts, craft quarters, harbors.
• Street Patterns: orthogonal grids vs. organic lanes; locate main processional routes.
• Flows: morning inbound (food/fuel), midday civic movement, evening guild/ritual flows.

B. Markets: Price, Guilds, and Safeguards

Treat in-game bazaars and agoras as economic theaters. What signals quality? Who arbitrates disputes? Where do taxes get assessed?

• Stalls & Specialization: cluster analysis (spices, textiles, metalwork, fish).
• Weights & Measures: show scales/rods when visible; discuss fairness & fraud controls.
• Guild/Authority: who sets rents, collects dues, enforces hygiene or festival closures?

C. Ports: Customs, Convoys, and Storage

Ports are cash registers for city-states and empires. Use harbors to teach customs, provisioning, and the infrastructure of power.

• Harbor Layout: breakwaters, quays, warehouses, shipyards, lighthouse/marker.
• Customs Flow: manifest → inspection → duty → warehousing → onward transit.
• Risk Controls: pilotage, signaling, patrol craft, fire safety near granaries.

D. Power: Palaces, Forums, Temples

Ask learners to trace decision circuits: where edicts originate, where revenues land, and how rituals legitimize authority.

• Edict Path: council → scribe → herald → marketplace notice.
• Revenue Path: customs/market dues → treasury → garrison provisioning.
• Legitimacy: festival routes connect temple precincts to civic squares.

E. Walkthroughs (Discovery Tour Paths)

Use these timeboxed routes to collect teachable screenshots and quick notes. Always label as “Game Reconstruction” and pair each stop with a Fact Card.

F. Comparative Frames (Game vs. Attested)

• Bazaar vs. Agora: Compare stall permanence, stoa architecture, and rent models.
• Harbor Cranes: Timber cranes vs. capstans; discuss load limits and labor.
• Administrative Facades: Notice herald boards vs. inscription stones.

G. Activities

1. Map Quiz (10 min): Learners label five civic/economic sites on a blank plan.
2. Flow Diagram (15 min): Draw a customs-to-market flow with three controls against fraud.
3. Build Task (30–40 min): “Design a Fire-Safe Warehouse”: sketch bays, vents, firebreaks; add a 120-word rationale with one source.
4. Reflection (5–7 min): “Where does political power touch everyday trade in this city?”

H. Accessibility Notes

• Provide alt-text packs for each route (3–5 images per stop).
• Use dyslexia-friendly handouts (1.5 line spacing, left-aligned, 12–14pt).
• Offer a no-images variant: text-only route + fact cards.

3. Religion, Ritual, and Daily Life

Religion in ancient societies was woven into daily life. Discovery Tours show temples, shrines, processions, and household scenes — all opportunities to teach how people understood the sacred in work, leisure, and governance. The goal is not to treat Ubisoft’s visuals as definitive, but to use them as doorways into attested practices.

A. Temples & Shrines

• Architecture: Columns, sanctuaries, forecourts; compare with real excavation plans.
• Functions: housing cult statues, receiving offerings, hosting oracles.
• In-game cue: altars with food, incense, or oil lamps; priests in robes.

Example walkthrough: Origins — Karnak Temple complex. Use screenshots of pylons, sacred lakes, and reliefs. Pair with British Museum or Louvre Egyptology collections.

B. Household Ritual

Discovery Tours often depict domestic interiors: hearths, shrines, storage rooms. These allow lessons on everyday piety.

• Greek Oikos: household shrine to Hestia; compare with vase imagery.
• Roman Lararium: statuettes of Lares/Penates; compare with Pompeii finds.
• Viking Home: fire pits and carved figurines; link to saga descriptions.

C. Festivals & Processions

• Egyptian Opet Festival: processional barges from Karnak to Luxor.
• Athenian Panathenaia: weaving of peplos, Acropolis rituals.
• Norse Blót: seasonal sacrifices, feasting, community decision-making.

Discovery Tours often stage crowd movement and music. Use this to simulate the sensory world of festivals while reminding learners of artistic license in sound and dress.

D. Daily Life: Work & Leisure

• Workshops: pottery wheels, smithies, weaving looms.
• Foodways: bread ovens, oil presses, mead halls; link to archaeobotany finds.
• Leisure: baths, theaters, board games (senet, knucklebones).

Activity idea: assign pairs to document one work setting and find a real-world artefact image that validates or contrasts the depiction.

E. Ethics & Sensitivity

When teaching with sacred spaces, avoid turning rituals into spectacle. Make clear to learners:

• Ubisoft visuals are interpretive reconstructions.
• Some practices (sacrifice, funerary rites) are contested topics in modern ethics.
• Repatriation debates: use artefact examples (e.g., Parthenon Marbles) to discuss heritage ownership.

4. Trade & Technology

Ancient economies relied on infrastructure and tools. Discovery Tours give visual anchors for teaching ships, roads, and workshops. When paired with real artefacts and archaeological reports, these become powerful gateways into material culture and technological transfer.

A. Trade Routes

Ubisoft’s maps show caravans, ports, and merchant convoys. These can illustrate:

• Egypt: Nile as trade artery (grain, papyrus, stone).
• Greece: Aegean maritime network; Delos as a trade hub.
• Viking World: rivers linking Scandinavia to Byzantium.

B. Ships & Maritime Tech

• Egyptian Barges: flat-bottom craft for Nile transport; compare with reliefs.
• Greek Triremes: three-tier oar banks; use museum ship reconstructions.
• Norse Longships: clinker-built hulls; compare with Gokstad and Oseberg finds.

Execution idea: pair screenshots with maritime museum models or Oxford Journal of Archaeology articles on naval construction.

C. Roads & Land Transport

• Roman Roads: layered stone pavements, mile markers; compare with extant Via Appia.
• Greek Paths: beaten tracks, mule usage; archaeology of rural infrastructure.
• Viking Routes: overland sledges, winter ice roads; saga references.

D. Tools & Workshops

• Metalworking: anvils, bellows, crucibles; pair with museum iron artefacts.
• Textiles: looms, spindle whorls; compare with finds from Athens and Viking graves.
• Construction: pulleys, ramps, chisels; align with stone quarry evidence.

E. Comparative Exercises

1. Ship Design: compare Norse clinker vs. Greek mortise-and-tenon joinery.
2. Road Lifespan: estimate years of durability for Roman vs. Greek rural track.
3. Workshop Noise: imagine soundscapes; compare smithy vs. weaving hall.

F. Assessment Options

• Quiz: Identify transport mode for five goods (grain, oil, furs, silver, pottery).
• Reflection: “How did technology shape empire growth?” (150 words).
• Build Task: Sketch a tool, label its parts, and cite one real museum artefact.

5. Lesson Plans & Activities

To turn Discovery Tours into curriculum-ready content, educators need modular lesson plans. These combine guided walkthroughs, fact cards, and assessment rubrics. Below are three sample lessons plus extension activities.

Lesson 1: The Market (45–60 min)

1. Warm-up (5 min): Show screenshot of a market stall. Prompt: “What is being sold?”
2. Exploration (15 min): Guided tour through bazaar/agora. Learners list 5 objects.
3. Source Link (10 min): Match each object to museum artefact via fact cards.
4. Assessment (15 min): Short write-up: “What controlled prices?”

Lesson 2: Ritual & Festival (50–65 min)

1. Warm-up (5 min): Show short clip of procession. Ask: “What senses are engaged?”
2. Exploration (15 min): Walkthrough of festival path; note music, crowd, costumes.
3. Source Link (15 min): Compare with inscriptions/festival calendars.
4. Assessment (15–20 min): Reflection essay: “What civic role do festivals play?”

Lesson 3: Trade & Tech (45–55 min)

1. Warm-up (5 min): Display ship screenshot. Ask: “How would this be powered?”
2. Exploration (15 min): Walkthrough harbor scene. Learners label cranes, cargo, crews.
3. Source Link (10 min): Compare with shipwreck finds or museum ship models.
4. Assessment (15–20 min): Short diagram task: “Draw a supply chain from port to market.”

Extension Activities

• Map Quiz: Place 10 major cities on a blank ancient world map.
• Glossary: Build a shared glossary of 20 terms (e.g., agora, lararium, trireme).
• Build Task: Model a workshop (paper, clay, digital sketch).
• Reflection Prompts: “What surprised you about daily life?”

Delivery Formats

• Slides (Google/PowerPoint) with screenshots + fact cards.
• Printable worksheets with QR codes linking to museum artefacts.
• Interactive packs on learning platforms (Moodle, Canvas).

6. Accessibility & Inclusion

Discovery Tours become truly lesson-quality when every learner can access the material. This module gives concrete patterns for low-vision, D/deaf/HoH, dyslexia, ADHD/autism, motor, and low-bandwidth contexts—while keeping the cyberpunk-light visual identity intact.

A. Text & Layout

• Typography: Use a clean sans for long paragraphs; reserve display fonts for headings only.
• Spacing: 1.5 line height, 16–18px body min on web; 12–14pt for printables.
• Contrast: Maintain WCAG AA contrast for text (light base, dark text, limited neon only on accents).
• Headings: Use semantic H2–H4 and short paragraph blocks (<120 words).
• Reading age: Offer a simplified “Read Easy” variant per lesson (≈ Year 7–8 reading level).

B. Images & Alt-Text Packs

Provide a zip or sheet with descriptive alt-text that names the visible, functional details learners need for assessment.

• Alt: “Stone quay with crane and amphorae stacked two-high; guard post to the right.”
• Alt: “Temple forecourt with incense altar and two priests in linen robes.”
• Alt: “Clinker-built longship beached on shallow shore; oars stowed.”

C. Audio, Video & Captions

• Captions: Provide closed captions for any voiceover. Include sound cues (e.g., “crowd murmurs”).
• Transcripts: Plain-text transcripts stored with lesson files for screen reader access and search.
• Playback: Avoid autoplay; offer playback speed controls and volume normalization.

D. Cognitive Load & Motion

• Chunking: Break walkthroughs into 3–5 steps with a single task per step.
• Signposting: At top of each lesson: Goal, Materials, Time, Outcome.
• Reduced Motion: Offer a no-pan/no-zoom video variant or stills-only sequence.
• Color Dependence: Do not communicate meaning by color alone; add icons/labels.

E. Inputs & Interactivity

• Keyboard-first: All interactive quizzes/accordions must be tabbable; show focus outlines.
• Target sizes: Minimum 44×44px tap targets on mobile.
• Error states: Clear messages with suggestions; do not rely on small red text.
• Drag & Drop Fallback: Provide button-based alternatives for motor accessibility.

F. Language & Multilingual Delivery

• Create a glossary with phonetic guides (e.g., “trireme (TRY-reem)”).
• Provide bilingual handouts where relevant (e.g., English–French for museum partners).
• Use plain-language summaries at the end of each section.

G. Low-Bandwidth & Print

• Light assets: Provide 1200px JPG screenshots <250KB; defer heavy video.
• Printables: Single-column PDF, light background, 12–14pt text, QR codes for sources.
• Offline kit: ZIP with text-only walkthroughs, alt-text, and worksheets.

H. Safety & Sensitivity

• Flag content notes (e.g., sacrifice, funerary scenes) at lesson start.
• Use opt-out alternatives (text-only or different scene) without penalty.
• Frame discussions with respect for living cultures and descendant communities.

7. Packaging for Schools & Museums

To be adopted widely, the History Engine must ship as a clean, reusable package: clear licensing, classroom-ready files, museum-aligned activities, and a traceable chain from game reconstruction to attested sources. This section specifies the deliverables and file hygiene so educators and curators can deploy with confidence.

A. Curriculum Mapping & Versioning

• Curriculum maps for KS3/KS4 (UK) + rough alignments to IB MYP/DP strands.
• Scope & Sequence: 14-day rotation with prerequisites, assessments, extensions.
• Versioning: semantic versions (e.g., v1.3.0) with CHANGELOG.md summarizing updates.
• Provenance footer on every worksheet: “Game Reconstruction” label + pack version + date.

B. Museum & Heritage Partners

Pair Discovery Tour scenes with local collections to convert curiosity into object-based learning. Provide ready scripts and signage.

• Object Pairing Sheets: per scene (market, harbor, temple, workshop) with 2–3 objects.
• QR Program: worksheet QR → museum catalogue entry (or gallery label). Ensure short links for print.
• Docent Scripts (2–3 min): “What you see in game” → “What the object tells us.”
• Family Trail Handout: picture-led pathway using 6–8 Fact Cards; language-light variant.

C. Licensing & IP Guardrails

• Pack License (recommended): CC BY 4.0 for your original instructional content (guides, worksheets, Fact Cards text).
  Rationale: encourages remix with attribution in schools.
• Game Media: only use non-extractive screenshots/capture compliant with Ubisoft Terms of Use. Label every frame “Game Reconstruction — © Ubisoft.”
• No asset extraction: do not redistribute raw models/textures/audio.
• Source Attribution: keep museum and journal credits in a metadata file, not on student pages (prevents layout bleed).

D. File Structure & Naming

Use predictable folders and names (include Made2Master in all filenames):

E. Distribution, SEO & Discoverability

• Shopify asset: host the latest ZIP and show a version badge.
• Anchors & interlinks: link /history/engine and /ac/discovery from every page.
• Schema: attach Article + FAQPage JSON-LD (kept in scripts; no visual bleed).
• Alt & captions: provide alt text and descriptive captions for 3 key images per module.
• Sitemap & robots: index,follow; update lastmod on new versions.

F. Evaluation & Reporting

• Teacher feedback form (5 min): difficulty, timing, outcomes.
• Student exit tickets: 2 prompts tied to lesson outcomes.
• Museum session log: attendance, object pairings used, common questions.
• Impact snapshot: #classes, #learners, #objects referenced, accessibility coverage.

G. Risk, Privacy & Consent

• Student media: get consent before sharing screenshots with student names/voices.
• GDPR/UK DPA awareness: store school files on approved drives; minimize personal data.
• Sensitive topics: include content notes and opt-out alternatives (text-only paths).

8. FAQ & Myth-busting

Learners bring popular myths into the classroom. This section equips teachers with fast rebuttals and short answers, while modeling citation discipline. Each FAQ item is phrased for unambiguous classroom delivery.

🛠️ Myth-busting as Method

• Always label in-game scenes as “Game Reconstruction.”
• Pair myths with one peer-reviewed source in your Fact Card Library.
• Encourage students to research the correction themselves.
• Celebrate myth-busting as critical thinking, not embarrassment.

9. Execution Framework: 14-Day History Engine Pack

The History Engine becomes real when structured into a repeatable two-week curriculum loop. Each day balances 1 Discovery Tour path, 2 Fact Cards, and 1 reflection task. Teachers spend <15 minutes preparing with ready-made packs.

A. 14-Day Roadmap

1. Day 1: Orientation — “What is a Game Reconstruction?” + Source Hygiene primer.
2. Day 2: City Slice (Alexandria) — markets, ports, authority.
3. Day 3: Comparative City (Athens/Piraeus).
4. Day 4: Ritual & Festival (Karnak or Panathenaia).
5. Day 5: Household Life (Roman lararium, Viking longhouse).
6. Day 6: Trade Routes — caravans, Nile grain ships.
7. Day 7: Maritime Tech — trireme vs. longship.
8. Day 8: Roads & Land Logistics — Roman vs. Norse.
9. Day 9: Workshop Deep Dive — pottery, metalwork, weaving.
10. Day 10: Governance & Power — palace, forum, temple.
11. Day 11: Myth-busting Carousel (Library, gladiators, helmets).
12. Day 12: Student Build Task — fire-safe warehouse or domestic shrine.
13. Day 13: Peer Gallery Walk — students present builds & critique.
14. Day 14: Synthesis & Reflection — “What history can games teach?”

B. Assessment & Badges

• Daily Exit Ticket: 2 prompts; one factual, one reflective.
• Portfolio: screenshot notes + Fact Cards collected into PDF.
• Badge System:
  • 🏛️ City Analyst — completes 2 city routes.
  • ⛵ Trade Mapper — diagrams 2 trade chains.
  • ⚒️ Craft Reconstructor — builds one tool/workshop task.
  • 📜 Myth-Buster — corrects 3 myths with sources.

C. Packaging & Delivery

Ship the 14-Day Pack as one ZIP bundle with:

• 14 slide decks (1 per day).
• 14 worksheet PDFs with QR-linked sources.
• 1 master Teacher Guide (timings, rubrics, accessibility notes).
• Source Index CSV + Alt-Text Pack CSV.
• Myth Index micro-cards (PDF/PNG).

D. Community & Iteration

• Teachers submit Fact Card add-ons back into the shared library.
• Museums add local object pairings (QR updates).
• Version control: update ZIP & sitemap; mark lastmod in robots.xml.
• Annual “Patch Notes” blog post: highlight new sources or game updates.

E. Confucian Community Framework

The History Engine reflects a Confucian principle: learning is communal order. By respecting sources, honoring heritage, and practicing discipline, teachers and learners become stewards of cultural memory. Each Fact Card is a ritual gesture; each walkthrough is a harmonizing act. The framework builds not just knowledge, but community virtue.