Photo credit: Kyle Espeleta

Michael Prestia

Technical Director

San Mateo, CA

mike@michaelprestia.com


Work Experience

Technical Director / Sledgehammer Games
Oct 2016 - Current

In my current role as Technical Director on Modern Warfare III, I collaborated with teams from other studios to ensure code and content integrated successfully between different depots. I was at the forefront of ensuring content from Modern Warfare 2 was available to players in Modern Warfare 3. Through all of production and into live season I worked with teams of engineers and content creators to identify how processes could be improved for development, live ops, and content creation and often helped implement those improvements.

Projects:

  • Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (2023)

Director of Gameplay Engineering / Sledgehammer Games
Jun 2022 - Oct 2022

As the Director of Gameplay Engineering leading into Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, I opened lines of communication and collaboration between gameplay teams from other studios. This helped us maintain a sense of stability for players between franchise entries while also allowing engineers to share time and resources as much as possible.

Projects:

  • Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 (2023)


Senior Lead Engineer, Multiplayer Gameplay and UI / Sledgehammer Games
Feb 2021 - Jun 2022

Up through shipping and into the live season of Call of Duty: Vanguard, I continued in my lead responsibilities for the multiplayer gameplay team. I also dedicated a lot of time to working with production and senior engineers on the UI team to ensure UI was on track for shipping while maintaining a high quality bar.

Projects:

  • Call of Duty: Vanguard (2021)

Lead Engineer, Multiplayer Gameplay and UI / Sledgehammer Games
Oct 2020 - Feb 2021

During production of Call of Duty: Vanguard I took on lead responsibilies for the UI engineering team as well. As this was a new area of engineering for me, I worked directly with engineers to ramp up and take on tasks. This knowledge helped me guide the engineers under my charge and helped me schedule and delegate tasks accordingly.

Projects:

  • Call of Duty: Vanguard (2021)

Lead Multiplayer Gameplay Engineer / Sledgehammer Games
May 2018 - Oct 2020

During the live season of Call of Duty: WWII I took on lead responsibilities for the multiplayer gameplay team. I led this team of 9 engineers through multiple DLC pack deliverables. I continued this lead role into production of Call of Duty: Vanguard.

Projects:

  • Call of Duty: WWII (2017)
  • Call of Duty: Vanguard (2021)

Senior Gameplay Engineer / Sledgehammer Games
Oct 2016 - May 2018

As a Senior Gameplay Engineer on Call of Duty: WWII I worked on several features across the game including minimap, player abilities, facial animation, and vehicle combat.

Projects:

  • Call of Duty: WWII (2017)

Software Engineer / Electronic Arts
Jul 2011 - Sep 2016

As a gameplay engineer on several iterations of NBA Live, I worked on several user-facing gameplay features including new technology for dunks, layups, and alley-oops. I also worked closely with animators and designers to create new animation-driven technology for jumpshots and freethrows that allowed for instantaneous feedback from user input.

Projects:

  • NBA Live 14 (2013)
  • NBA Live 15 (2014)
  • NBA Live 16 (2015)

Software Engineer / 360Ed
Sep 2009 - Jul 2011

As a generalist engineer at 360Ed, I created all new UI for 2 educational games for minigames and for rendering web content in game. I also led a small team of engineers in developing biology-focused minigames.

Projects:

  • Conspiracy Code
  • Conspiracy Code: Mindbender
  • Biology minigames

Education

Florida Interactive Entertainment Academy, University of Central Florida
2008 - 2009

M.S., Interactive Entertainment


University of Central Florida
2004 - 2008

B.S., Computer Science