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Senior External Development Director

CRITERION EXTERNAL DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR

We’re Criterion, and we love making games!

Over the last fifteen years we’ve entertained millions of players around the world with our award-winning games. From Burnout & Need for Speed to the critically acclaimed VR mission for Star Wars Battlefront, Starfighter Assault in Battlefront ll and most recently Firestorm in Battlefield V, Criterion have always pushed the boundaries, delivering through technical excellence, outstanding game feel and AAA audiovisual quality.

We place enormous value on creative collaboration, fresh ideas, and unique perspectives. Our studio is a healthy mix of industry veterans and newcomers working together to inspire, support, and educate one another. We encourage free experimentation, innovation and exploration with regular Game Jam’s and “off-the-grid” time.

The working day has space carved out for everyone to play games – by themselves or together, be they tabletop or videogames, we love them all. Learning from the widest range of experiences makes our own games better.

Over the years, we’ve learned that crunching is flat-out bad, so we don’t do it.

The Challenge Ahead:

Criterion are now working on the next NFS and as we look to the future and the exciting opportunities the franchise offers, we are looking to nurture and expand new relationships with external partners

We are looking for someone to partner with the team, starting with the content management team to help lead and inspire the craft and culture of External Development at Criterion. You will help build relationships with our teams, existing external partners and new partners.

As well as the operation role working at a franchise level there is a business development aspect of this role as we find new partners through collaboration with the studio team and EA departments.

You are passionate about all of the following:

• You will work with creatives in all disciplines. We believe in working with great people so we’re looking to partner with external creatives in Narrative, Design, Audio and other areas too.
• The way we create it: not doing things just because that’s the way we’ve done them before, understanding change is a necessary part of success.
• Collaboration: although we want to make great visuals it’s all in the pursuit of creating great games so collaboration with other disciplines is essential .

What an External Development Director does at Criterion:

As a leader you will set your priorities but a typical week could include:

• Reporting to the Franchise Director of Product Development you will Work with Designers, Art Directors, Tech Directors, Producers and DDs to create an environment where our content creators can excel whilst working with all teams
• Establish and work with partner studios on the games we work on
• Work with EA partner teams to seek their help and advise to achieve our goals for external development,
• Ensure the Team is applying production strategies and working with the discipline directors to ensure all teams are structured and resourced.
• You will work with Art, Audio and Design Directors, DD & Production management team and partner studios to coordinate the milestone schedule and contribute to game delivery
• Interpret design documents and pre-production materials to a clear picture of project scope and associated task breakdowns
• We believe in thinking ahead. You will work with our teams to ensure delivery of the current project but also working with the Franchise Group looking at how External Development will work on future projects.
• Establish and document outsource best practices
• Coordinate with Distribution Development Manager on addressing vendor gaps, training requirements, work orders.
• Manage incoming content, organise and distribute in engine for the internal art team
• Manage performance issues and provide guidance to external partners

Additional abilities an External Development Director needs:

You don’t have to be all things to all people, however your art background and production skills will establish you as a credible art leader. This is probably a mix of:

• Experience as a Project Manager, working in the art production or VFX industry
• Business development and relationship management
• Experience in game production design process and methodology
• Coordinate vendor communication to internal team
• Gather references and support the look development process
• Create vendor training packages
• Experience with the practices to onboard a partner such as contract negotiation

What’s in it for you? Glad you asked!

Naturally, we offer great compensation packages.

More importantly, because we love working with outstanding creators, we maintain a culture that appreciates creative freedom and autonomy.

We thought you might also want to know:

We’re based in the lovely town of Guildford – 35 minutes from central London. Whilst we’re based here we’re obviously currently all working from home and support a culture where this is still possible even when there isn’t a pandemic!

More about our studio: http://criteriongames.com/

More about our location:https://www.ea.com/careers/careers-overview/guildford