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Principal Animation Engineer (Unannounced Project)

We are looking for an experienced Animation Engineer to work shoulder to shoulder with tech artists and animators to develop systems and tools in the Unreal Engine that push the limits of the next generation of AAA games. You will also work closely with gameplay teams to build technologies which help realize our shared vision as it relates to animation and character interactions.

Your work will include implementing and maintaining a robust animation system which provides fluid motion through a complex range of game states. You will support animation and rigging needs for character customization and retargeting. Your expertise will be leveraged to help build, analyze, and review prototypes which you will ultimately implement in convert to highly efficient code.

If you have always wanted to use your technical knowledge to lead games out of the Uncanny Valley; if creating systems that support a world class team determined to create behavior so lifelike that players can lose themselves and just revel in the glory of imagination, then this is the role that you’ve been looking for.

About Our Team

The Engineering team at ArenaNet thrives on a wide array of perspectives, experiences, and interests. We know that the best creations come from healthy and friendly teams. Our work is woven together with the efforts of other disciplines and crafts within game development. We seek out voices and ideas that might be new to us. We are always on the lookout for ways to help each other, both within the Engineering team, and throughout the studio.

Who We Are Looking For

You, our ideal candidate, are an experienced animation engineer, well versed in the Unreal Engine’s animation systems, and comfortable working in C++ on AAA games. You are familiar with relevant physics and mathematical concepts and know how to leverage that knowledge in animation systems.

You have an eye and intuition for the feel of locomotion systems, animation blending, and realistic physics implementations related to characters and are highly knowledgeable in these areas. You have experience implementing and leveraging motion warping features, additive animations, ragdoll features or you have knowledge of these systems and demonstrate the ability to ramp up on them quickly. You are familiar with animation compression best practices.

You hold yourself to high standards of code quality. You understand that writing tests are key to effective QA of complex modern games. You participate in developing and evangelizing standards and best practices with both engineers and content creators. You understand it is an engineer’s responsibility to determine and communicate technical constraints and you innovate to remove those constraints when you can.

Performance is always on your mind, and you know how to monitor, profile, and optimize systems’ performance and memory footprint. You demonstrate a strong ability to analyze and breakdown complex problems and architect systems with efficiency and expandability in mind.

You will bring to this role your vision for animation and the drive, ownership, and innovation to see it fulfilled. Communication is critical to this role both in building the high-level understanding of your vision but also in the day-to-day interactions with artists, designers, engineers, and others on the team.

A growth mindset is core to your approach, and you are a lifelong learner. You love to learn from your teammates, from industry experts, from a variety of sources and you share that knowledge and expertise to the benefit of the whole team.

Good production practices are important to you, and you will know how to manage expectations and the scope of a project. You will be comfortable managing your tasks and time effectively as well as communicating with project managers information to help them understand how we work, what risks we may encounter and how to mitigate those risks. You understand the value of balancing work with your personal life such that you work efficiently during work hours to give yourself and your teammates the time you need to take care of yourself and the ones you love.