Sonia Fizek studied English Literature and Linguistics at the University of Lodz (Poland), graduating in 2007 with an M.A. thesis on the rise of cyberfiction and the impact of digital technology on literature. She then pursued her academic path as a doctoral candidate at Bangor University (UK) where she completed her PhD in media and game studies.

Over the last eighteen years, she has gained ample experience as an educator, researcher, leader and mentor at various higher education institutions across Europe. In 2019 she held a professorship at Media Akademie – Hochschule Stuttgart and prior to that a lectureship in game studies and design at the School of Informatics and Design at Abertay University in Dundee (Scotland). In the years 2013-2015, she was a post-doctoral researcher at the Centre for Digital Cultures at Leuphana University Lüneburg. She also worked as a film festival coordinator, team leader, freelance blogger, and translator with over 10 years of experience in the fields of technology, film, and dental medicine.

Fizek is an active member of the research community as a co-editor-in-chief of the Journal of Gaming & Virtual Worlds, and a board member for multiple journals. She also serves as an advisory expert and external counsellor to many initiatives, such as the Sustainable Games Alliance (SGA) and the German Toy Industry Association (Deutscher Verband der Spielwarenindustrie, DVSI). In 2024 she was a jury member for the German Computer Games Award (Deutscher Computerspielpreis, DCP) and in the years 2021-2024 she was a jury member for the Kreativ-Transfer, a funding program supported by the Federal Government for Culture and Media (Bundesregierung für Kultur und Medien, BKM).

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sonia-fizek-1693391

Sonia Fizek has been teaching at various international higher education institutions in the UK, Germany, and Poland: Bangor University, Abertay University, Leuphana University Lüneburg, Goethe University of Frankfurt, Design Akademie Berlin, and the University of Lodz. This experience has allowed her to develop a rich didactic repertoire. At TH Köln, Cologne Game Lab, she offers a wider range of seminars for B.A. and M.A. students in Media and Game Studies with a focus on digital play theory, critical player research, aesthetics of digital games and media, queerness, and environmental issues around gaming.

Fizek works at the intersection between game studies, media theory, digital cultures and environmental humanities. Her latest book Playing at a Distance (MIT Press 2022) is an exploration of digital aesthetic and human-non-human distributed agency in videogames, with a focus on AI and automation. Fizek also explores questions related to materiality of digital media, media ethics and politics, production studies as well as environmental sustainability of video games and their development. Her current research on environmental aspects of digital games and media and is conducted within an EU HORIZON grant “Sustainable TRAnsiTion for Europe’s Game IndustrIES“

Sustainable Transformation for Europe’s Game Industries (STRATEGIES) (2024-2028, Work Package Scientific Lead)
https://www.strategieshorizon.eu
Granting Institution: European Union
Program: “Cultural and creative industries for a sustainable climate transition” (Horizon-CL2-2023-heritage-01-02)
Consortium: TH Köln, Manchester Metropolitan University, Aalborg University, Warsaw University, Utrecht University, Malta University, also including leading private sector partners in the European video game and board game industry

Greening Games – Building Higher Education Resources for Sustainable Video Game Production, Design, and Critical Game Studies (2021-2024, Principal Investigator & Project Coordinator)
http://greeningames.eu
Granting Institution: DAAD German National Agency,
Program: Erasmus+ KA220-HED – Cooperation Partnerships in higher education
Consortium: TH Köln, Charles University of Prague, Breda University of Applied Sciences, Turku University

This is a selected list of publications since the appointment at TH Köln in 2020. The complete list of publications may be accessed in this document.

Fizek, S. (2022). Playing at a Distance. Borderlands of Video Game Aesthetic. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
www.mitpress.mit.edu/9780262544627/playing-at-a-distance/

Peer-reviewed journal articles

Fizek, S. (2025). Gra w Intra-aktywność. In Teksty Drugie, special issue: Posthumanizm wobec tworzenia wspólnot techno-organicznych, eds. Justyna Stępień, Katarzyna Ostalska. Instytut Badań Literackich PAN. DOI: 10.18318/td.2025.1.12 https://rcin.org.pl/Content/245143/WA248_281928_P-I-2524_fizek-gra_o.pdf

Fizek, S. (2024). Nature playing. On the experience of contemplating technologically mediate nature within the game world of Riders Republic. Journal of Games & Culture. London: Sage. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/15554120241273329

Fizek, S. (2024). From media history of digital games to games in the age of the Anthropocene. In Journal of Gaming & Virtual Worlds, 16.1, eds. Sonia Fizek, Melissa Kagen. Bristol: Intellect. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1386/jgvw_00088_2

Fizek, S. (2023). The spectated, the social, the beautiful and the caring. In Journal of Gaming & Virtual Worlds, 15.3. Bristol: Intellect: https://intellectdiscover.com/content/journals/10.1386/jgvw_00084_2.

Fizek, S., Fiadotau M, Garda, B. M., Wirman, H. (2023). Teaching environmentally-conscious game design: Lessons and challenges. In Games: Research and Practice. ACM Journals (Association for Computing Machinery). ACM Digital Library, ETC Press: https://dl.acm.org/doi/full/10.1145/3583058.

Fizek, s. (2023). Editorial: The spectated, the social, the beautiful and the caring. Journal of Gaming and Virtual Worlds, 15.3, Bristol: Intellect.

Fizek, S. (2022). Through the Ludic Glass: Making Sense of Games as Algorithmic Spectacles. Special Issue: Game Analysis Reloaded. Game Studies 22 (2). http://gamestudies.org/2202/articles/gap_fizek.

Fizek, S. (2021). Quo Vadis German Game Studies? A Commentary. PAIDIA. Zeitschrift für Komputerspiel Forschung. https://paidia.de/quo-vadis-german-game-studies-a-commentary

Peer-reviewed book chapters

Fizek, S., Eggel, R. D. (in print, 2025). Eco-critical Game Studies – Zur einer kritischen Umweltforschung von Spielen und ihren Macher:innen. Spielforschung, eds. Junge, J., Falkenberg, K., Inderst, R., Koubek, J. Nomos.

Fizek, S., Eggel, R. D. (in print, 2025). Towards Greener Video Game Making Processes and Practices – People and the Planet. Post-conference anthology: FROG – Future and Reality of Gaming, Vienna.

Fizek, S. (2025). Metaverse (Re)Visions. Back to the Future of the Internet. In Gaming the Metaverse, eds. Gundolf S. Freyermuth, Benjamin Beil. Bielefeld: transcript (in partnership with De Gruyter). DOI: 10.14361/9783839474624-007  https://www.transcript-publishing.com/978-3-8376-7462-0/gaming-the-metaverse/?c=413000064 

Fizek, S. (2024). Material Infrastructures of Play. How the Games Industry Reimagines Itself in the Face of Climate Crisis. In Ecogames. Playful Perspectives on the Climate Crisis, eds. Raessens, Joost / Werning, Stefan / Op de Becke, Laura. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. 
https://www.aup.nl/en/book/9789048557219/ecogames  

Fizek, S. (2022). Reading between the Lines. JODI’s %WRONG Browser.co.kr. Navigation, Begriffe des digitalen Bildes, Bd. 2. eds. Inge Hinterwaldner, Daniela Hönigsberg, Konstantin Mitrokhov. Hildesheim; München: Georg Olms Verlag; Universitätsbibliothek der Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München. https://publishing.ub.uni-muenchen.de/index.php/oplmu/catalog/book/120

Fizek, S. (2022). Slow Play. Notes on Enveloping Ambience in Video Games. In Video Games. New Directions in Game Research II, eds. Aguilar Rodríguez, Jimena / Alvarez Igarzábal, Federico / Debus, Michael S. / Maughan, Curtis Lee / Song, Su-Jin / Vozaru, Miruna / Zimmermann, Felix eds., Mental Health | Atmospheres |. Bielefeld: transcript. https://www.transcript-verlag.de/978-3-8376-6264-1/mental-health-atmospheres-video-games/?number=978-3-8394-6264-5

Fizek, S. (2022). Operatives Ambient. Zur Ästhetischen Wirkung von Hintergrundoperationen in Computerspielen. In Christopher Lukman, ed. Kontrolmaschinen. Zur Dispositivtheorie des Computerspiels. Braunschweiger Schriften zur Medienkultur. Lit Verlag Münster / Hamburg / Berlin / London. https://lit-verlag.de/isbn/978-3-643-14780-6/

Fizek, S., Dippel, A. (2020). Gamification of Terror. Power Games as Liminal Spaces. In Games and Ethics. Theoretical and Empirical Approaches to Ethical Questions in Digital Game Cultures. Maike Groen, Nina Kiel, Angela Tillmann, André Weßel, eds. London: Springer Link, pp. 77-94. 10.1007/978-3-658-28175-5_6 https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-658-28175-5_6

Reports and public science

Fizek, S., Eggel, D. R., Lindner, M., Paller, C., Limpach, O., Derivry, H., Grünberg, I., Taeger, M. (2025). Green Transition at Play. State of the Art Report on the Environmental and Social Sustainability of Video and Board Game Industries. The report is a deliverable of the Horizon Europe project STRATEGIES: https://www.strategieshorizon.eu/reports.

Fizek, S. (2024). Playing for Future(s). Can video games help us re-write the future in times of climate crisis? Futures Literacy Dossier. Bundeszentrale für Politische Bildung.
https://www.bpb.de/themen/kultur/digitale-spiele/546959/spielen-fuer-die-zukunft/

Fizek, S. et al. (2023). Greening Games Education. A Report on Teaching and Researching Environmental Sustainability in the Context of Video Games. The report is a deliverable of an EU/DAAD funded project „Greening Games“: http://greeningames.eu/greening-games-education-report/