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Game Design Director

Phoenix Labs is looking for a Game Design Director to join one of our new game initiatives in our Vancouver studio.

This person will work directly on a new IP and will shape and communicate the design vision of the product to the team and the studio as a whole. They will use their deep, rich understanding of games to inform their decisions while educating and elevating the team’s solutions. They will inspire their team to create memorable experiences for the player by helping cross-discipline teams with thoughtful solutions. They will work with the other discipline leaders to align the efforts of designers to the product strategy, helping teams to consistently achieve great results for players.

Phoenix Labs is a dynamic and iterative environment. We pride ourselves on our ability to continuously improve and do hard things. People are our most important asset, and we look for each new person to add to our mosaic culture. Our goal is to be a place where a diverse group of driven, collaborative, and empathetic developers can do their best work.

Applicants must live or be willing to relocate to within commuting distance to the Vancouver studio. This is a full-time, permanent position. This job is unsuitable for remote employees.

Responsibilities:

• Champion the design vision of the game, working closely with other discipline leaders to define and execute on that vision.
• Clearly communicate that vision to the team as a whole, using a variety of tools to ensure a multi-discipline team is fully engaged with the vision and is excited to work together to deliver it.
• Inspire other designers to a high standard around the craft and tools of design, ensuring the whole team is operating to a high quality standard.
• Advocate for relevant emerging trends in the game design space and how they can be adapted for the product. Highlight what current high-water marks look like within similar spaces in games and how those will drive player perception and expectations for the product.
• Build and manage a team of designers, setting direction and helping them to grow.
• Contribute at an organizational level by working with other design vision holders to mould a healthy, collaborative problem solving environment across a cross-functional multidisciplinary organization, ensuring that design helps to elevate the strengths of the entire team.
• Remain current on game industry trends including new games and game genres, emerging game design methods and techniques.

Required:

• Extensive experience being a design vision holder for products in pre-production, production and release.
• Experience leading design teams in shipping multiple titles or large multi-feature updates for live games.
• A track record of using iterative development to build and ship large-scale design features to millions of players.
• Experience building and managing a team of designers through strong articulation of a strategy and quality bar that resulted in a polished, cohesive player experience.
• Passion for video games, with a relentless thirst for learning from playing them.