Bio
Sarah R Ziebarth
Producer & VR Narrative Designer
Sarah has been obsessed with designing stories for as long as she can remember and, since reading Ernest Cline’s Ready Player One, has made it an ambitious life goal to bring those adventures to life with virtual reality. With dual majors in both Game Design and Development Art and Computer Science from the University of Wisconsin-Stout, she’s proficient in video game and VR technologies, as well as creative writing and narrative design. She is additionally versed in agile project and team management, organizing scrum meetings, and leading groups that consist of multiple disciplines.
Producing has become second nature to Sarah in her time creating video games, and through it she has learned how to encourage the strengths of others in order to create a more powerful team. To her, keeping the group on schedule, managing tasks, or simply lending a helping hand are all part of the reward of making something amazing.
As a producer, Sarah has had many opportunities to manage team projects at UW-Stout, including Boogie Beyond, a virtual reality dance game, and Apocalypse of the Damned Level 9: the Cafetorium, a pseudo-game featured in the UW-Stout Theatre Department's spring 2023 musical production of Be More Chill. Other projects she's had the privilege to work on include various 2D, 3D, and VR games, with awards and honorable mentions including best visuals, best gameplay, and most anticipated.
Virtual Reality Narrative Design is Sarah's other major specialty. Inspired both by her passion for storytelling and her fascination with VR, she enjoys bringing the unexpected to audiences, as well as experimenting with game narrative in ways players have never seen before! Drawing on immersive theatre productions, such as Punchdrunk's award-winning Sleep No More, and the classic thrill of video games, Sarah hopes to design interactive experiences that will bring about a new genre of game made for the future.