Accountant / Finance (Senior/Lead)

Bonfire Studios, Inc; Irvine (CA); Hybrid; USD 195,000 - 244,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

Full benefits package

Additional perks

Job summary

Bonfire Studios, Inc is seeking a strategic Finance and Accounting leader to define the company’s long-term revenue, expense recognition, and reporting as our business model evolves in Irvine. This role focuses on establishing policy, governance, and actionable insights rather than just closing the books.

You'll lead the close, manage external partners, own platform and publisher reporting, and drive ERP transformation with automation to scale with the business. CPA required.

Qualifications

• 10+ years of accounting experience, including 7+ years in video games.
• Know ASC 606 well enough to originate policy positions on novel monetization models.
• Have led relationships with major publishers and platform holders.
• Deep fluency in deferred revenue modeling, virtual currency accounting, and international royalty structures.
• Have led an ERP evaluation or migration and can make the business case for systems investment.
• CPA required.
• Autonomy in ambiguous, high-stakes environments.
• Bonus points if you’ve supported multi-platform live-service titles at scale and have experience building or leading a team.

Responsibilities

• Setting the company's revenue recognition policy and methodology under ASC 606 (including box sales, microtransactions, and virtual currency).
• Leading the close process end-to-end, directing an external accounting team and AP/AR resources.
• Owning platform and publisher reporting, including reconciling statements from Sony, Microsoft, Valve, and PC cafés, and improving royalty/licensing reporting to partners.
• Leading cross-functional alignment with business, publishing, analytics, and live ops for financial data and analytics across the studio.
• Owning treasury strategy and execution, including banking controls, liquidity management, and insurance strategy.
• Leading ERP transformation, evaluating and roadmap for new accounting systems and automation scaling.
• Shaping forecasting, KPI reporting, and revenue insight connected to product and live-ops strategy.
• Representing finance in high-stakes conversations such as external audits and tax structuring.
• Establishing financial rigor with team development as it scales.

Skills

Strategic finance leadership

ASC 606

ERP evaluation

Publisher relations

Deferred revenue modeling

Virtual currency accounting

International royalties

Education

CPA certification

Job description

Full-time Hybrid, Irvine, California, United States

What's the one game you couldn't put down? The game that connected you with friends, and made you feel like you belonged? If a game has ever defined a chapter of your life, then you already know the spark we’re chasing. Our mission is to ignite that same feeling for players; the thrill of competition, the joy of community, and the belonging of finding your own corner of a larger world.

Great games begin with people who dare to dream big. If that sounds exciting, you might be exactly who we’re looking for.

Bonfire is a group of experienced and ambitious developers, proud to be creating our first original IP: Arkheron. It is a fast-paced, competitive PVP game set in a surreal dark fantasy world where 15 teams of three battle their way up the Tower. In a world built from memories, you will loot powerful items to create and adapt a unique build-out that will change your strategy and combat experience with every Ascension.

On the People Experience team, people are at the heart of everything we do, and our team is dedicated to finding extraordinary talent and creating an environment and culture they can thrive in. Whether a potential candidate, team member or a new contract partner, we are passionate about creating a welcoming and inclusive community that empowers each individual to do their best work and feel connected. As a diverse team of experts with a deep commitment to exceptional experiences, we create a tailored employee journey that begins at onboarding and lasts throughout your entire career at Bonfire and beyond. From fostering your growth and development to offering robust benefits that provide support to you and your family, we’re the scaffolding that amazing teams and great games are built on.

We're looking for a strategic Finance and Accounting leader to join our Operations group to define Bonfire’s long-term approach to revenue, expense recognition, and reporting as our business model evolves. This isn't a role about executing the close and moving on. It's about setting the direction other teams build on, so that every close, every forecast, and every decision leadership makes is grounded in numbers people can trust. Your work will shape how the whole studio understands its own performance, and how confidently we act on what we learn. If you want real ownership over how that story gets told, and want to build the systems and judgment other people lean on to tell it well, this role was built for you.

YOU’LL CONTRIBUTE BY:

• Setting the company's revenue recognition policy and methodology under ASC 606 (including box sales, microtransactions, and virtual currency), and partnering with the studio to keep the data behind it accurate and timely
• Leading the close process end-to-end, directing an external accounting team and AP/AR resources, while building the judgment and quality bar they operate against
• Owning platform and publisher reporting, including reconciling statements from Sony, Microsoft, Valve, and PC cafés, and using that visibility for crucial internal reporting, resolving systemic discrepancies, and improving royalty/licensing reporting to our partners
• Leading cross-functional alignment with business, publishing, analytics, and live ops so that we have a cohesive structure for financial data and analytics across the studio
• Owning treasury strategy and execution, including banking controls, liquidity management, excess cash investment, and corporate insurance strategy, with authority to set policy, not just execute it
• Leading ERP transformation, owning the evaluation, business case, and roadmap for our next accounting systems, and building the automation strategy that will scale with the business for years, not just the next close
• Leading cross-functional alignment with business, publishing, analytics, live ops, and FP&A, connecting forecasting, KPI reporting, and revenue insight directly to studio-wide product and live-ops strategy, and shaping how those teams think about revenue before decisions get made
• Serving as a crucial partner in Finance Leadership, representing the finance function in high-stakes, high-ambiguity conversations such as external audits, tax structuring, and financial due diligence
• Establishing the financial rigor Bonfire operates by today, with room to mentor and develop the team as it scales

WE’RE EXCITED ABOUT YOU BECAUSE YOU:

• Have 10+ years of accounting experience, including 7+ years in video games, with a track record of building or overhauling revenue recognition frameworks, not just applying existing ones
• Know ASC 606 well enough to originate policy positions on novel monetization models before precedent exists
• Have led relationships with major publishers and platform holders, not just processed their reporting
• Are deeply fluent in deferred revenue modeling, virtual currency accounting, and international royalty structures, and have shaped how a studio approaches them
• Have led an ERP evaluation or migration and can make the business case for systems investment
• CPA required.
• Are comfortable operating with significant autonomy in ambiguous, high-stakes, fast-changing environments
• Bonus points if you've supported multi-platform live-service titles at scale and have experience building or leading a team

THIS MIGHT NOT BE THE ROLE FOR YOU IF:

• You haven't worked with premium games, DLC, virtual currency, subscriptions, or live-service monetization; this role assumes that context
• You want a clearly scoped, well-defined function with an established roadmap to execute against; this role is about building the definition and the roadmap, not inheriting either
• You want to lead from a distance and don't want to stay close to the details; we're looking for someone who still finds satisfaction in getting reconciliations and journal entries right, even while leading the function
• You're looking for a purely functional accounting role; this spans treasury, FP&A strategy, ERP transformation, and org-wide financial rigor

YOU’LL LOVE WORKING AT BONFIRE BECAUSE WE:

• Embrace bold challenges with creativity and courage, making the tough calls to build a game we’re proud to play every day.
• Keep fun at the core: we play Arkheron daily, staying grounded as players. If it’s not more fun than yesterday, we fix it. We don’t chase trends; we listen by playing.
• Stay truly independent, with decisions driven by the team — not by investors or a board.
• Thrive in a culture of passion, trust, and shared ownership; where transparency matters and egos don’t.

The base salary range for this role is $195,000-$244,000 USD. Depending on your experience and level (whether you’re closer to mid-level or principal), your offer may land above or below that range. We don’t just look at years on a résumé — we think about the impact you can have on the team and the game.

When we connect, we’ll happily walk you through the full details.

• Every new teammate receives equity, plus a full benefits package and some extra perks to make work (and life) better.

And don’t worry — anything you share with us in the application process is just for recruiting and won’t be shared. You can read more in our privacy policy.