Associate Animation Director, Living World - Elsewhere Entertainment

Activision Blizzard Inc.; Santa Monica (CA); On-site; USD 127,000 - 235,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Medical, dental, vision coverage

401(k) with company match

Paid holidays and vacation

Job summary

Activision Blizzard, Inc. in Santa Monica is seeking an Associate Animation Director, Living World for Elsewhere Entertainment. You will define and champion the living-world animation vision, guiding ambient behaviors, worlds, and character interactions to enhance immersion.

You will mentor animators, align cross-disciplinary teams, and drive scalable animation systems from concept through polish, balancing creative ambition with technical feasibility to deliver high-quality experiences.

Qualifications

• Extensive experience in game animation with leadership on AAA titles.
• Proven experience leading multidisciplinary teams and influencing creative direction across departments.
• Deep understanding of how animation, AI, gameplay systems, narrative, audio, and environmental storytelling work together to create immersive worlds.
• Experience directing or developing systemic content, such as ambient behaviors, contextual interactions, social systems, crowds, environmental storytelling, or living-world features.

Responsibilities

• Defining and driving the animation vision for living-world systems, ambient behaviors, environmental interactions, and authored vignettes.
• Establishing and maintaining a high creative and quality bar for content that makes the world feel alive, reactive, and full of character.
• Leading cross-functional teams to deliver living-world experiences from concept through implementation and polish.
• Partnering with Design, Engineering, Art, Audio, and Narrative to ensure animation enhances gameplay systems and immersion.
• Translating high-level creative goals into clear direction, priorities, and actionable plans for development teams.
• Guiding scalable animation systems that support emergent gameplay and dynamic world interactions.
• Reviewing work and providing creative feedback to solve artistic, technical, and production challenges.
• Mentoring animators and animation leads to foster collaboration and growth.
• Identifying risks and opportunities early and aligning teams around solutions.
• Driving improvements to workflows, tools, and production practices for high-quality content at scale.
• Collaborating with animation leadership to ensure a consistent vision across gameplay, narrative, and living-world experiences.

Skills

Game animation leadership

Multidisciplinary leadership

Maya proficiency

Animation pipelines

Storytelling & animation

Strong communication

Contextual game AI knowledge

Tools

Maya

Job description

Job Title: Associate Animation Director, Living World - Elsewhere Entertainment Requisition ID: R028282

Elsewhere Entertainment is looking for an Associate Animation Director, Living World to help shape the animation vision for an exciting new IP. In this role, you will define and champion the animation vision for the living world, creating believable, reactive, and memorable experiences that bring the game world to life. You will partner closely with Animation, Design, Engineering, Art, Audio, and Narrative teams to guide the development of systemic behaviors, ambient character interactions, and authored world vignettes that enrich player immersion and support the game's creative vision.

As a senior creative leader, you will align teams around a shared vision, drive cross‑disciplinary collaboration, mentor animators, and help ensure that living‑world experiences achieve the highest standards of quality, authenticity, and player impact.

You’ll help us by:

• Defining and driving the animation vision for living‑world systems, ambient behaviors, environmental interactions, and authored vignettes.
• Establishing and maintaining a high creative and quality bar for content that makes the world feel alive, reactive, and full of character.
• Leading cross‑functional teams to deliver cohesive living‑world experiences from concept through implementation and polish.
• Partnering with Design, Engineering, Art, Audio, and Narrative to ensure animation enhances gameplay systems, worldbuilding, storytelling, and player immersion.
• Translating high‑level creative goals into clear direction, priorities, and actionable plans for development teams.
• Guiding the development of scalable animation systems that support emergent gameplay, contextual behaviors, and dynamic world interactions.
• Reviewing work in context, providing creative feedback, and helping teams solve complex artistic, technical, and production challenges.
• Mentoring animators and animation leads while fostering a culture of collaboration, craftsmanship, and continuous improvement.
• Identifying creative risks, dependencies, and opportunities early, and aligning teams around effective solutions.
• Driving improvements to workflows, tools, and production practices that enable the creation of high‑quality systemic content at scale.
• Collaborating with animation leadership to ensure a consistent animation vision across gameplay, narrative, creatures, cinematics, and living‑world experiences.
• Representing living‑world animation in planning, reviews, milestone assessments, and cross‑department decision‑making.

You’re awesome because you have:

• Extensive experience in game animation, including leadership responsibilities on one or more shipped AAA titles.
• Proven experience leading multidisciplinary teams and influencing creative direction across departments.
• A deep understanding of how animation, AI, gameplay systems, narrative, audio, and environmental storytelling work together to create immersive worlds.
• Experience directing or developing systemic content, such as ambient behaviors, contextual interactions, social systems, crowds, environmental storytelling, or living‑world features.
• Strong creative vision and the ability to communicate that vision clearly to diverse teams and stakeholders.
• Exceptional collaboration, communication, and relationship‑building skills.
• A strong foundation in animation principles, acting, physicality, timing, staging, and visual storytelling.
• Experience working with game engines, animation systems, state machines, blending, procedural techniques, and implementation pipelines.
• The ability to balance creative ambition with technical constraints, scalability requirements, and production realities.
• A thoughtful and constructive leadership style that inspires trust, ownership, and team growth.
• Strong problem‑solving skills and the ability to navigate ambiguity while maintaining forward momentum.
• Proficiency with Maya and familiarity with modern motion‑capture and game‑animation pipelines.

Our World At Activision, we strive to create the most iconic brands in gaming and entertainment. We're driven by our mission to deliver unrivaled gaming experiences for the world to enjoy, together. We're home to some of the most beloved entertainment franchises in the industry and continue to push the boundaries of interactive entertainment through world‑class talent, creativity, and technology.

Activision Blizzard, Inc. is the world’s largest interactive entertainment company, with operations across North America, Europe, and Asia. We are home to some of the most beloved entertainment franchises including Call of Duty®, Skylanders®, World of Warcraft®, Overwatch®, Diablo®, Candy Crush™, and Bubble Witch™. Our combined entertainment network delights hundreds of millions of monthly active users in 196 countries, making us the largest gaming network on the planet! We’re proud to be recognized as one of FORTUNE’s "100 Best Companies To Work For®” for five consecutive years and have earned a spot on FORTUNE’s “Most Admired Companies,” and “Future 50” lists. Our 10,000+ global employees are some of the best and brightest talents across entertainment, media, and technology.

Rewards We provide a suite of benefits that promote physical, emotional and financial well-being for ‘Every World’ - we’ve got our employees covered! Subject to eligibility requirements, the Company offers comprehensive benefits including:

• Medical, dental, vision, health savings account or health reimbursement account, healthcare spending accounts, dependent care spending accounts, life and AD&D insurance, disability insurance
• 401(k) with Company match, tuition reimbursement, charitable donation matching
• Paid holidays and vacation, paid sick time, floating holidays, compassion and bereavement leaves, parental leave
• Mental health & wellbeing programs, fitness programs, free and discounted games, and a variety of other voluntary benefit programs like supplemental life & disability, legal service, ID protection, rental insurance, and others
• If the Company requires that you move geographic locations for the job, then you may also be eligible for relocation assistance. Eligibility to participate in these benefits may vary for part time and temporary full-time employees and interns with the Company. You can learn more by visiting https://www.benefitsforeveryworld.com/

In the U.S., the standard base pay range for this role is $126,800.00 - $234,580.00 Annual. These values reflect the expected base pay range of new hires across all U.S. locations. Ultimately, your specific range and offer will be based on several factors, including relevant experience, performance, and work location. Your Talent Professional can share this role’s range details for your local geography during the hiring process. In addition to a competitive base pay, employees in this role may be eligible for incentive compensation. Incentive compensation is not guaranteed. While we strive to provide competitive offers to successful candidates, new hire compensation is negotiable.