Merchants of Istanbul: A Serious Game on the History of the Early Modern Balkans

Nicole Immig & Ninja Bumann Justus-Liebig Universität Giessen
Discussion:
Agustín Cosovschi École française d’Athènes & Antonis Hadjikyriacou Panteion University

Since April 2022 the Chair of Southeast European History at the Justus-Liebig University of Giessen/Germany has been developing a Serious Game on the history of Southeast Europe in the early modern period. The game aims to convey basic historical and topographical knowledge about the history of Southeast Europe from the 15th to the 18th century in an appealing and playful manner. In Merchants of Istanbul, players accompany a trade caravan along one of three possible routes through the Balkan region
The first route – which will be presented in this talk – leads them from Lviv/Lemberg to Istanbul. The goal of the game is to ensure the safest possible transport of goods from Europe to Istanbul and to complete the journey with as much profit as possible by negotiating city-specific luxury goods, practicing resource management and overcoming dangers and obstacles on the journey. The presentation will give insights into the idea development, utilisation of primary source material, work in an interdisciplinary project-team and the implementation and usages of the game in university teaching.

This session serves as a prelude to the upcoming Digital History Seminar for the Mediterranean and the Balkans, a joint initiative of the École française d’Athènes and the Research Centre for Modern History at Panteion University, to be launched in the next academic year.