Arbitology: Dei Gratia Rex
A game of storytelling and kingly life simulation in an alt-historical 12th century England. Make your choices wisely, for they affect history itself. Live and die well — prove you are, by the grace of God, king.
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Game contextLatest: IGF Team
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Updated: Jul 14, 2026Publisher statusHow the game's publishing relationship is classified. | ||
Updated: Jul 14, 2026Creative controlWho appears to retain creative control of the game. | ||
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10 itemsAbout the Game
A Conquest Unfinished
Duke William of Normandy tasted victory at the Battle of Hastings, but not without paying a price in blood. While he afterwards took London and held a hasty coronation, he succumbed to his wounds shortly thereafter. His young son, William Rufus, succeeded him — an easily controlled puppet for the other Norman lords.Meanwhile in the north Earls Morcar and Edwin, with the cooperation of Stigand, Archbishop of Canterbury, propped up their own puppet king in Edgar the Ætheling. These pretenders of the House of Godwin never relinquished their claim on the English throne, though the opportunity to press it has thus far eluded them.
A tense peace descended upon the land. Now, fifty years later, the status quo is nearing its end. Can you, the grandson of William the Bastard, finish that which he began?
Game Features
- Play the role of a young Norman king of a fractured England
- Text-based strategy gameplay
- Balance the interests of competing factions
- Live the best life you can; you will be judged by your legacy
- Meaningful choices with real consequences, not merely a choice of three colors
- Deep, simulation-driven event system
- Judicious use of procedural generation ensures replayability
- Hard historical fiction which rejects fantasy and popular tropes
- Artwork in the style of an illuminated manuscript
- Early music soundtrack based on real medieval compositions
- Words: many fine, hand-picked words
- Conquest and map painting, if such is your fancy
