The KTH Environmental Humanities Laboratory is excited to host a half-day interactive workshop on May 29th 2026 led by postdoctoral researcher Tijana Rupčić. This workshop focuses on the critically acclaimed games Subnautica (Unknown Worlds Entertainment, 2018) and ABZÛ (Giant Squid Studios, 2016), which immerse players in richly imagined underwater worlds that frame the ocean as both a site of wonder and danger.
Participants will have the opportunity to engage with curated gameplay segments and guided play sessions, exploring how these games construct aquatic environments through mechanics, sound, and visual design. The workshop will examine how underwater spaces are presented as complex ecological, technological, and emotional systems, while also addressing themes of survival, exploration, and environmental storytelling.
Through group discussion and collaborative analysis, participants will reflect on how digital media represent the ocean as a space of risk, beauty, and ecological imagination. The workshop will also consider how infrastructures, ruins, and environmental cues function as narrative devices, and how these virtual experiences shape our understanding of real-world oceans and environmental responsibility.
This workshop continues an ongoing series exploring how different video games shape our perception of environments and ecological systems.
Attendance at the workshop is free and open to all students, faculty, and staff. Registration is limited to ensure participants have adequate time for gameplay and discussion. Refreshments will be provided.
Tijana Rupčić is a Postdoctoral Ragnar Holm Research Fellow at the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Sweden. A historian of technology, gamer, and self-described infrastructure detective, she explores how humans build worlds—from power grids and road networks to archives, bureaucracies, and video games.
