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Senior System Designer
2 years ago
KingsIsle Entertainment, established in 2005, is a proven MMO hit-maker with 50+ million registered users across both our MMOs with vibrant and strong communities. Our award-winning game Wizard101 is currently in its 13th year and Pirate101 is in it’s 9th. We attribute our success to great people, and we recognize the value of every team member. We work hard and have fun, whether it’s with lunchtime gaming sessions or office outings to the movies. The working environment, friendly teammates, and support for growing careers all contribute to the long tenures many people enjoy at KingsIsle.
POSITION SUMMARY
As an integral part of the team, this role requires you to work on and contribute to all aspects of the game’s design. You will review and iterate on work in progress systems and features while coordinating with the lead designer and creative director to help maintain and promote the vision of the game. As all systems and features involve multiple departments, cross-discipline communication will be key to making sure everyone understands what the goal of the feature is and seeing it to completion in a polished, AAA state.
RESPONSIBILITIES- Own major aspects of feature design in both a development and live operations capacity
- Determine gameplay experience goals for designs, and tune features to meet those goals.
- Craft clear, succinct, and impactful design specifications that serve as the source of truth for the product
- Communicate and collaborate with all team disciplines, including artists, animators, modelers, engineers and producers to get support from the team and guide a project from initial design to final production.
- Must maintain clear and concise documentation for all balance and game mechanics they are responsible for.
- Improve designs based on playtests, game metrics, team input and community feedback.
- Be an active member of the Design team, brainstorming and writing designs, and providing feedback to other designers.
- Become an expert on the game and our community, drawing from our large, varied player base and our past games to make and defend intelligent design choices going forward.
- Stay up to date by researching market titles; sharing knowledge of useful designs and experiences with teammates.
- Become a mentor to more junior members of the team.
QUALIFICATIONS- Minimum 3-5 years game design experience on a shipped or live product.
- Knowledge of the MMO genre, ideally including Wizard101 and Pirate101
- Strong work ethic, initiative, critical thinking skills and ability to anticipate problems.
- Experience at writing design specifications and building via an iterative process
- Progressive thinking while remaining energetic and motivated to overcome challenges with practical solutions.
- Champion a design and get the team excited to work on it.
- Become proficient in multiple proprietary development tools.
- Effective at working both autonomously and in groups of different profiles.
- Knowledge of and enthusiasm for gaming: playing, deconstructing and creating.
- Comfortable with MS suite (Word, Excel, Powerpoint, etc.), Google Docs, Visio, JIRA, online collaboration suites such as Confluence.
PERKS & BENEFITS- Competitive compensation
- Health, dental, and vision care benefits
- 401(K) with employer match
- Company fun days, parties, and unlimited PTO
CONSIDERATIONS- Please make sure that the durations of your education and employment on your resume are included in month/year format.
- Salary will be commensurate with experience.
- Applicants must be legally able to work in the U.S. for KingsIsle.
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