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Lead UX Designer

Would you like to work on some of the greatest franchises in gaming history? What about working on our new original IP? Certain Affinity is the largest independent developer in Texas, based out of Austin, and a growing presence in Toronto, Canada. Our culture reflects the values and the vibrant nature of the cities we call home. This includes a commitment to evolution, diversity, excellence, and work-life balance. We're best known for co-developing numerous AAA FPS games, though now we are creating compelling new games of our own. We're always on the lookout for amazing talent to join our team.

As Lead UX Designer, you will champion the user experience for our games and how that experience extends to each game’s online community. You will work directly with the Game Director, Design Lead, and UX/UI staff for each project to ensure that all aspects of the game’s interface are easily understood and accessible by the player. You will be embedded with a game team to present interface and user experience ideas to various groups to help build consensus for a unified UX and UI direction, then help execute on that vision.

Only applications with a cover letter, resume, and portfolio will be considered.

Responsibilities

• Set project standards for UI and UX to drive functionality, accessibility, usability, and consistency throughout a project
• Be the main interface with the design lead(s) on projects, including taking ownership of specific project deadlines, deliverables, usability testing, and research
• Drive the UX/UI vision, team, and best practices throughout a project lifecycle
• Mentor and manage a team of UX designers and UI artists, including identifying team needs and helping drive the hiring and training for the UX team
• Create conceptual wireframes, user flow diagrams, low-fidelity prototypes for design review, and discussion and testing purposes
• Collaborate with artists to create high-fidelity mockups to solidify design direction and planning
• Collaborate with designers and engineers to brainstorm and drive innovation in online functionality and features
• Collaborate with designers and engineers to plan game features that fit together into a seamless and accessible user experience
• Design training and onboarding that helps users quickly become proficient in core game mechanics
• Design features that encourage a friendly, approachable, and inclusive online community
• Create working prototypes for usability and proof-of-concept testing
• Observe and interpret the results of usability testing and live game metrics, sharing conclusions with the team that help increase accessibility and informs design decision-making game-wide
• Produce finished design specs for the final game user interface, including in-game UI (e.g., HUD)
• Mentor other designers in UX design and testing techniques, methodology, and best practices

Requirements

• Experience as an interface or user experience designer for web or game applications
• Has made contributions to the UX of at least three shipped games
• Excellent analytical and problem-solving skills and a solid understanding of user-centered design principles to design a complete interface for all game features that are ultimately functional, usable, appealing, and accessible
• Awareness of trends in hardware and operating systems, interface design, interactive design, and competitive software to help identify opportunities for innovation
• Ability to observe, understand and translate research into actionable insights for interface improvements
• Ability to identify usability testing requirements and drive methods to achieve successful testing
• Must have solid skills with Ui/UX prototyping software such as Axure RP or a similar program
• Console gameplay or development experience

Extra Credit

• Game industry experience designing UI for games, preferably on the console
• iOS, Android, and mobile game development experience
• Game industry experience designing gameplay systems of any sort
• Formal IA training
• Graphic design skills
• Psychology education
• Experience collaborating or running user research
• Persona creation

Certain Affinity or its partners or affiliates run background checks on candidates or employees with the written authorization from the candidates or employees. These may be done for the purposes of offering employment or determining eligibility to work on a specific project. Multiple searches may be required.

Certain Affinity does not accept unsolicited referrals or resumes from any source other than directly from candidates.