Research
Why
My work has four main goals:
Analysis
I have developped a semiotic-based methodology of videogame analysis to reveal how their cultural content (ideas & values) goes from being communicated (via narratives, rules, audiovisuals and embodied actions) to being interpreted in terms of subjective beliefs acquiring significance for the players. What makes this approach unique is the focus on the playful possibilities of games.
Philosophy
My analysis of videogames is based on a theory of the human mind rooted in the philosophy of language. Five notions are at the heart of my take on such theory: belief, discourse, experience, indeterminacy and intersubjectivity. I use digital games to inquire on such concepts and on how humans interpret realities.
literacy
To become an expert of videogames I have played hundreds of games for thousands of hours. I love to share this knowledge of mine for the purpose of building and spreading a digital literacy about games. Allowing people to discover new digital experiences and to understand games is a fundamental part of my work.
What
The objects and topics of my research. Click on the pictures and links to read my papers or watch me discussing them!
AI & Games
How and why do non-human agents of videogames can be interpreted as intelligent by humans? By clicking on the picture you'll find a paper focusing on artificial intelligence [Italian]. Here is also a second one [Italian] exploring the notion of personhood.
Communities & Games
Videogames are nowadays a fundamental aspect of sociality, with interactions leading sometimes to friend and love relationship. I conceived a framework to understand how digital worlds can create communities and a sense of social belonging. [French]
Love & Sexuality in Games
One of my first papers was about experiencing love relationships and sexuality in digital games! [English]
Religion & Games
I did a literature review of the different aspects of religion in games: from mere references to actual experience. [English] I also examined the polarization [Italian, starts at 1h29min] of culture through the representations of religion and divinities in games.
Avatars' Faces & Identity
I studied how digital faces in videogames are used in three different ways to express and experience identities. [Italian] Moreover, I also worked on how gazing through digital faces allow subjectivity [English] to be involved in the experienced reality.
Future & Science Fiction
Do we still imagine the future in our times of crisis? I compared the cultural representations of the future in hundreds of movies, series and games of the last 20 years. [Italian]
Metaverses & Reality
When Zuckerberg's "Horizon" Metaverse launched in 2022, I was one of the first scholar that explored and analyzed it! [Italian]
Rhetorics and Ideology in Games
Which are the aspects, mechanics and features of videogames that can convey complex meanings in a convincing way? [Italian] This question was also in the very first paper [English] of my career!:
Belief & Digital Realism
​Why do we often describe digital objects and virtual experiences as real? This main question at the heart of my research had me working on the philosophical [English], technological [English] and even magical [Italian] aspect of our beliefs in reality.
Health & Games
As a kid, I imagined myself as a doctor. So it was a pleasure for me to introduce real doctors to VR and to work on the design of a game for ASD population [English] .
Politics & Ethics of Digital Play
People always ask me questions about the dangers and violence of digital games and virtual worlds. In the years I have therefore reflected about the political significance of digital play [Italian] and on the ethical implication behind the fear of the virtual [Italian}.
Semiotics of Games
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Semiotics is not only the discipline I use to study games, but also the theory I work on and try to improve through games! If my 500 pages book [Italian] on the semiotics of games is a little bit too much for you, here [Italian] is a friendly and lighthearted introduction to my ludosemiotics
Transhumanism & Posthumanism
I analyzed the video games Nier: Automata [English] and Cyberpunk 2077 [French] to reflect on how the faces of androids, cyborgs, robots, and drones can assume the qualities of humanity and change our cultural assumptions on it.
VR & XR
Like Neo in The Matrix, I spent several months in VR to compare and understand the role of this technology in the experience of virtual worlds and virtual selves. [English] Some years later I also imagined a future in which we would live our whole life inside a bugged virtual reality! [English]
Keywords of secondary topics of my research
#Anime & Japanese Culture
#Closure & Economy in Games
#Cancel Culture & Nerd Masculinity
#Education & Learning Games https://iass-ais.org/call-for-participation-efss-xxvi-6-10-sept-2022-sozopol-bulgaria/ https://www.academia.edu/126091775/2024_From_philosophy_of_videogames_to_video_game_design
#Cinema & Games
#Hypertextuality & Multimodality https://caer.univ-amu.fr/wp-content/uploads/JE-Hypertexte-programme.pdf https://nemosancti.eu/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Semiosis2023-Program_.pdf https://www.academia.edu/82008044/2022_Shangai_Seminar_On_Multimodality_in_Videogames?from_sitemaps=true&version=2
Who
My research was deeply influenced by the people I had the luck to meet within institutions and organizations that I had the privilege to work with. Here are some of them:
Where
I've been in many amazing virtual realities, but I've also presented my work at conferences in many amazing places around the world. Here you can check the full programs of my conferences and talks.
