This paper presents an ongoing collaborative project between the Heidelberg University of Jewish Studies (HfJS) and Korion Interactive GmbH, which is developing a serious game to raise awareness of the unequal treatment of Jews and combat anti-Semitism. It currently consists of three prospective modules in which players embark on time travel using a magical AI swatch and a fantastic elevator. In the first module, which has already been developed, they meet the young Jo (Joseph Süss Oppenheimer, 1698/99-1738, protagonist of the Nazi propaganda film "Jud Süß") and flee with him from anti-Jewish violence to the Venetian ghetto; they get to know Jo as a mediator between the Jewish and Christian worlds, who has to contend with legal restrictions, economic barriers, and antisemitic stereotypes.
Two complementary modules on anti-Semitism in relation to Israel are currently being developed: one about 14-year-old Theodor Herzl (1800-1904) in Budapest in the late 19th century, who struggled with emerging political anti-Semitism and pressure to acculturate; and another about Esther Shakine (born 1932), a girl who was on the ship "Exodus" in 1947 as a survivor of the Shoah and who embodies the displacement after the Shoah and the restrictions under the British Mandate. Drawing on historical sources such as Venetian ghetto regulations, Herzl's diaries, and Esther's account, the game uses interactive storytelling to simulate the agency of minorities amid oppression and persecution.
Through branching decisions and immersive scenarios, players reflect on recurring patterns of religiously and racially motivated discrimination—from spatial confinement to modern exclusion—and thus develop greater empathy for both historical victims and contemporary Jewish experiences of hatred such as Israel related antisemitism. Initial playtests show increased sensitivity to exclusion and inequality, positioning the game as an educational tool against various forms of contemporary antisemitism.