Design Director, Gameplay - The Believer Company

There are many things that make Believers who we are, but our defining characteristic is an unwavering dedication to the player experience. We believe that player-first development is critical for games, esports, and all forms of media that allow us to engage with our favorite worlds and heroes. We are not just a game company, we are a company for Gamers. We believe that collaboration and diverse thought drive innovation, and we foster a development culture around that principle.

Game Designers at the Believer company craft the systems, mechanics, and content that creates fun for our players! We are constantly putting ourselves in their shoes to better understand our players’ needs, and how we can best address them. We design holistically, and we can’t wait to engage with the other crafts to make our players’ dreams come true. We are deeply involved in shaping the values and opportunities that our games are based upon. 

As a Design Director, you will help us deliver best in class Gameplay experiences for our player audience. You will ensure that the gameplay is interactive, full of fun, and deeply social in nature. You will build, coach, and mentor a cohesive and talented game design team with servant leadership. While you’re a veteran of game development, you’re still excited to dive into the engine and build. And at the end of the day, you will inspire players and lead them to new experiences they’ve never had before.

A strong professional history in shipping and/or maintaining games with great core gameplay is a must. You will provide leadership across diverse game design topics including the moment to moment core experience, combat, levels, encounters, and characters. While you are focused on gameplay, you will be consulted on progression and metagame systems. And you will be a coach and direct manager for game designers, managing their performance, and helping them to achieve our players’ dreams. 

Responsibilities:

• Provide direct game design leadership on the moment to moment gameplay of our prototypes

• Work with design and studio leadership to set vision for the game

• Collaborate with design leadership to set values for the department 

• Lead, coach, and performance manager game designers ranging from associates to principals 

• Design gameplay systems and content across our first prototypes. 

• Ownership and autonomy of complex game features or systems. 

• Prototype, experiment, and capture learnings. We aim to experiment quickly, fail fast, and ensure we’re pushing forward towards the fun every single day. And we document our findings so that we always build upon our progress. 

• Work with artists, producers, QA and engineers to bring our gameplay to life 

• Playtest the game constantly - we believe that we learn best by going through the player experience at every opportunity. 

Required Qualifications:

• Deep familiarity with team-based games, open world games, and MMO’s. 

• 5+ years of experience managing game designers 

• Experience in early game development and prototyping

• Strong ability to collaborate across disciplines and articulate design thoughts

• Excited to dive into the engine to build and prototype 

• Hungry to learn and capable of providing constructive and thoughtful feedback to others

Desired Qualifications:

• Ability to predict outcomes of game design decisions on players and other content

• 9+ years in game development, on live service or box products. Shipped and/or maintained 2+ AAA titles. 

• Paper prototyping game theses and concepts

• Implementation, especially in Unreal 4 or 5

• Scripting, modding or other technical skills highly desired

• Can use existing frameworks to develop novel solutions and reverse-engineer designs

BENEFITS

Making great games is hard, so we do our best to make the other parts less hard.

• Medical, dental, vision, short-term disability, long-term disability, and life insurance. Believer pays 100% of monthly costs for these plans!

• Access to Rightway health insurance service to help you navigate health insurance

• Spring Health mental health services

• 10 observed holidays +  10 days for Winter Break and “Take What You Need” PTO policy

• Remote-friendly team

• Current generation Macbooks or Windows machines

We are committed to continuing to expand our benefits and perks to support all Believers.

ABOUT US

We’re an independent game studio with developers all over the world and a home base in Los Angeles, California. Our team of industry veterans and talented newcomers is united by a deep love for players and a commitment to put them at the center of the games we create, the worlds we build, the stories we tell, and the business we run to keep the fun going for as long as players keep believing. 

DIVERSITY / EQUAL OPPORTUNITY

We are committed to creating a diverse environment where Believers of all backgrounds can do their best work and grow professionally. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, color, religion, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, national origin, genetics, disability, age, or veteran status.