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Przybyłek, Marcin Sergiusz

Entry updated 25 August 2025. Tagged: Author.

(1968-    ) Polish sf writer, coach, game designer and consultant, with a background in medicine and corporate training; best known for the ambitious multi-volume Gamedec series (2004-2023). In the 1990s he debuted as an artist in visual and music fields related to computer graphics; and published essays and books on psychology and pop culture. He began to publish work of genre interest with "Małpia pułapka" ["Monkey Trap"] (November 2002 Nowa Fantastyka), introducing Torkil Aymore, the "game detective" or "gamedec" of the eponymous series (see also Crime and Punishment; Games and Sports). The series, spanning Granica rzeczywistości ["The Border of Reality"] (coll 2004) and expanded through Sprzedawcy lokomotyw ["Locomotive Sellers"] (2006), Zabaweczki. Błyski ["Toys. Flashes"] (2008), Zabaweczki. Sztorm ["Toys. Storm"] (2010), Czas silnych istot ["A Time of Strong Beings"] (2012 2vols), Obrazki z imperium ["Pictures from the Empire"] (2015 2vols), and Love & Hate (2023), evolves from Near-Future detective noir Cyberpunk to Military SF, Space Opera, and Hard SF Utopian speculation, threading themes of transhumanism (see Posthuman), the Singularity, Identity, and the psychological impact of Technological acceleration. The early books, as well as the most recent, prequel-like Love & Hate, show Aymore largely in the Virtual Reality gaming worlds of 2196+, investigating crimes and conspiracies whose moral ambiguities echo Chandleresque noir hardboiled detection. Later books in the series scale up to a centuries-spanning arc showing the struggles of a post-scarcity civilization, from interplanetary Politics and military conflicts to transhumanist dilemmas, such as, to name one interesting dimension, the consequences of mass Uplift of AI-boosted NPCs from what were once videogames. The series has also been adopted into the Board Game Gamedec (2013) and the Videogame Gamedec (2021). The latter, available in English, is unfortunately the only part of Przybyłek's work easily accessible to Anglophone speakers.

Przybyłek also wrote the Orzeł Biały ["White Eagle"] trilogy (2016-2025), tongue-in-cheek post-apocalyptic adventures featuring willing real-life Polish Fantastika writers and members of Fandom as characters: its protagonists are real people who applied during the process announced by the author and presented character ideas (see also Tuckerisms). He also authored the Near Future corporate Satire CEO Slayer (2014), about a vigilante targeting the rich; the philosophical fable Symfonia życia ["Symphony of Life"] (2019) which portrays alternate lives of its main character (see Parallel Worlds); and most recently, Stara kobieta i smok ["Old Woman and a Dragon"] (2025). That novel blends Science Fantasy and Technofantasy in a Ruined Earth setting where the remnants of ancient digital technology are revered as magic. Centred on an ageing schoolteacher-turned-dragon-hunter and her young apprentice, the novel subverts heroic fantasy archetypes, weaving together a quest adventure and philosophical reflections on ageing and the process of technological memory becoming a myth.

He has also written a number of short stories, fifteen set in his Gamedec universe. One non-Gamedec story is set in the Warhammer 40,000 universe: "Aquila, Aquila" (in Jedenaście pazurów ["Eleven Claws"], anth 2010). [PKo]

Marcin Sergiusz Przybyłek

born Pułtusk, Poland: 14 December 1968

works

Gamedec

  • Gamedec. Granica rzeczywistości ["The Border of Reality"] (Warsaw, Poland: SuperNowa, 2004) [coll: Gamedec: pb/]
  • Gamedec. Sprzedawcy lokomotyw ["Locomotive Sellers"] (Warsaw, Poland: SuperNowa, 2006) [Gamedec: pb/]
  • Gamedec. Zabaweczki. Błyski ["Toys. Flashes"] (Warsaw, Poland: SuperNowa, 2008) [Gamedec: pb/]
  • Gamedec. Zabaweczki. Sztorm ["Toys. Storm"] (Warsaw, Poland: SuperNowa, 2009) [Gamedec: pb/]
  • Czas silnych istot ["A Time of Strong Beings"] (Lublin, Poland: Fabryka Słów, 2012) [published in two volumes: Gamedec: pb/]
  • Obrazki z Imperium ["Pictures from the Empire"] (Warsaw, Poland: Rebis, 2015) [published in two volumes: Gamedec: pb/]
  • Gamedec. Love & Hate (Warsaw, Poland: Rebis, 2023) [Gamedec: pb/]

White Eagle

  • Orzeł Biały (Warsaw, Poland: Rebis, 2016) [White Eagle: pb/]
  • Orzeł Biały 2 (Warsaw, Poland: Rebis, 2017) [White Eagle: pb/]
  • Orzeł Biały 3 (Ustroń, Poland: War Book, 2025) [White Eagle: pb/]

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