Teaching
I teach game design and interactive arts classes (and other things) in college, workshops and companies.
Since 2011 teaching has been a big part of my work. I started applying game design techniques to topic like public speaking, presentation skills and business skills in workshop and companies.
In 2018 I was selected as the Game Designer in residence at MICA (Maryland Institute College of Art, Baltimore, MD, US) starting teaching more focused Game Design classes as part of the residency. After the residency I moved to a full-time position in the Interactive Arts department at MICA creating new classes inherent to Immersive Experience Design, in 2020 I lead the department as Interim Chair.
I’m one of the project leader of Trust in Play - the European School of Urban Game Design where I lead the Nomadic Branch. Lately hosting a workshop on urban games has become the first mandatory step for the design of urban games, in order to have a truly shared process of co-creation with the communities of the area where the game will be hosted, two example of this process are Klink (Matera 2017) and Lumina (Chiaravalle, Milan, 2018).
MICA - Maryland Institute College of Art
Classes I’ve thought (in bold classes I’ve created)
Interaction as Art (MICA)
Game/Play (MICA)
Games+Theater (MICA)
Live Immersive Production (MICA)
Game Design Senior Thesis (MICA)
Cartographie (MICA)
Advanced Tabletop Game Design (MICA)
Audience Development (TrustInPlay)
Game Design 101 Workshop (TrustInPlay)
PowerPitch Workshop (≈80 runs for Startup / Companies / Accelleration programs)
Rapid idea prototyping Workshop (NonRiservato - ITA)
Extra activities
Founder and promoter of the International Faculty and Staff Alliance at MICA: affinity group for International individuals working in the US
Member of the Cross Campus Alliance: research group with members from different constituencies to start a process of Shared Governance
What students think
“Thank you for being an amazing teacher and person!
I'm glad that I had the chance to meet you, create/play fun experiences with you and everyone, and learn career tips from you.”
MICA Game Design program Thesis student
“You are one of my favorite professor, having your class is the luckiest thing!”
Game Design Thesis student
Download my DEI statement here
“I love Matteo! He brings a unique and sociable perspective to games and he has a lot of experience with urban gaming specifically. “
Game/Play student
“He was very invested in encouraging us to experiment and learn how to produce theatrical and physical games, and really helped us with our individual projects”
Advanced Tabletop Game Design student
“Matteo is so clearly talented at his area of focus that critique were amazing experiences. I love when critiques become huge moments of learning. I am leaving this class with a clear differentiation in knowledge from not just myself before entering the class but also the general world. Learning from teachers such as Matteo is why I came back to school, and is a validation that I made the right choice.”
Game/Play student
Urban Game Design Workshops
Since 2017 I’ve developed a 2 days urban game design workshop for creatives, business and communities. The workshop is a condensed version of game design and theory and design exercises and immersive experience design.
It’s also now part of my practice in urban game design since co-creation and community building are two of the most important aspect of my interventions.
