Associate Art Director

Scopely; California; On-site; USD 146,000 - 215,000; Full time

Benefits offered by this job

Equity

Bonuses

Healthcare benefits

Retirement benefits

Pet insurance

Paid holidays

Paid Scopely free days

Unlimited paid time off

Job summary

Scopely, a leading mobile games company, is seeking an Associate Art Director to join our art team in California. You’ll work with the Senior Art Director and leadership to shape the game’s visual identity and guide art from early development through delivery.

You’ll translate the artistic vision into briefs, reviews, and actionable feedback while also contributing hands-on in at least one art discipline. The role blends high-level direction with practical craft.

Qualifications

• 5+ years of professional experience creating art for games, animation, film, or related visuals.
• Experience defining, communicating, and executing an artistic vision from development to delivery.
• Hands-on in at least one art discipline, with emphasis on character or environment art.
• Strong ability to communicate visual direction and lead multidisciplinary reviews.
• Familiarity with art bibles, style guides, and development pipelines.

Responsibilities

• Define visual identity, style guides, briefs, references, and quality standards.
• Lead visual reviews, critiques, kickoffs, and alignment sessions with constructive feedback.
• Guide creation of characters, environments, props, lighting, animation, UI, and other visuals.
• Collaborate with design, narrative, engineering, production, and partners to carry artistic intent.
• Contribute hands-on through concept development, paintovers, blockouts, or callouts.
• Understand milestones, surface risks, and keep priorities on delivery.
• Support artists, external partners, and vendors with direction and mentorship.
• Improve visual review processes and communicate priorities to artists and stakeholders.

Skills

Art direction

Character art

Environment art

Visual communication

Mentorship

Job description

Scopely is looking for an Associate Art Director to join our art team. Working with the Senior Art Director and creative leadership, you’ll help shape the game’s visual identity and guide art from early development through delivery.

This role focuses on creative direction, visual judgment, and alignment across disciplines. You’ll translate the artistic vision into clear briefs, references, reviews, and actionable feedback. You’ll also contribute hands-on in at least one art discipline, moving between high-level direction and detailed critique, paintovers, or blockouts.

What You Will Do

• Partner with the Senior Art Director and creative leadership to define the game’s visual identity, principles, style guides, briefs, references, and quality standards.
• Align art disciplines and partner teams around shared goals, dependencies, handoffs, and decisions. Lead visual reviews, critiques, kickoffs, and alignment sessions with clear, constructive feedback.
• Guide the creation and refinement of characters, environments, props, lighting, animation, VFX, UI, and other visual components, maintaining cohesion and variety.
• Work with design, narrative, engineering, production, and external development partners to carry the artistic intent through development.
• Contribute hands-on through concept development, paintovers, blockouts, callout sheets, reference packages, prototypes, or other art tasks.
• Partner with production and discipline leads to understand milestones, surface risks, and keep creative priorities moving toward delivery.
• Support artists, external partners, and vendors with clear direction, feedback, and mentorship.
• Improve visual review and direction processes, represent the art team in cross-functional discussions, and communicate priorities to artists, partners, and senior stakeholders.

What We’re Looking For

• 5+ years of professional experience creating art for games, animation, film, or a related visual medium, or equivalent experience, with a record of taking on increasing creative responsibility.
• Experience helping define, communicate, and execute an artistic vision from early development through delivery.
• Strong hands-on experience in at least one art discipline, with particular relevance to character art, environment art, or both.
• Ability to communicate visual direction, facilitate constructive reviews, and collaborate with multidisciplinary teams, external partners, and distributed contributors.
• Working knowledge of production planning, prioritization, and milestone constraints, with the judgment to balance creative priorities and delivery needs.
• Experience creating or contributing to art bibles, style guides, visual development packages, mood boards, paintovers, callout sheets, or similar direction-setting materials.
• Understanding of game art and real-time production pipelines, plus familiarity with relevant 2D and/or 3D content creation tools.
• A portfolio that demonstrates artistic judgment, visual problem-solving, hands-on craft, and the ability to guide work from concept to completion.
• Experience in mobile game development or art direction.

Bonus Points

• Familiarity with the Unity game engine.
• Experience supporting live service content development.

For candidates in CA, CO, NJ, NY, and WA, the annual salary range is provided below. In addition to base pay, employees may be eligible for equity, bonuses, and a comprehensive benefits package, including healthcare benefits, retirement benefits, pet insurance, paid holidays, paid Scopely free days, and unlimited paid time off. Base pay offered may vary depending on job-related knowledge, skills, and experience.

CA, CO, NJ, NY, and WA Annual Salary Range

$146,200 — $215,000 USD

About Scopely

Scopely is a leading video game and global interactive entertainment company, home to many of the world’s most beloved and enduring experiences, including two of the most successful mobile games of all-time “MONOPOLY GO!” and “Pokémon GO,” along with “Stumble Guys,” “Star TrekTM Fleet Command,” “MARVEL Strike Force,” “WWE Champions,” the Scrabble® franchise, “Yahtzee® With Buddies,” and many others. Across mobile, web, PC, and console, Scopely creates, develops, publishes, and live-operates one of the most diversified and award-winning portfolios in the games industry — bringing hundreds of millions of players together through a shared love of play.

Founded in 2011, Scopely is powered by its exceptional team — including thousands of world-class gamemakers around the globe, a distinctive tenet-driven culture, and its proprietary technology platform, Playgami. Together, these strengths have fueled Scopely’s position as the #1 mobile games company in the U.S. and #2 globally, generating more than $10 billion in lifetime revenue. Whether building global sensations like “MONOPOLY GO!” from the ground up, or expanding through strategic acquisitions, including the FoxNext, GSN, and Scopely Explore games businesses — Scopely consistently delivers experiences players love today and return to for years to come.

Recognized multiple times as one of the "100 Most Influential Companies in the World" by TIME magazine and one of Fast Company's "World's Most Innovative Companies" and “Best Workplaces for Innovators,” Scopely believes that video games can be a force for good — creating meaningful connections, vibrant communities, and making life better through play.

Scopely has global operations and partners across four continents in more than a dozen countries worldwide. For more information, visit: https://www.scopely.com/.

Notice to Candidates: Scopely will never request payment or financial information during the application or hiring process. Please apply only through our official website and verify that all Talent Partner communications come from an email address ending in @scopely.com.

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Employment at Scopely is based solely on a person's merit and qualifications. Scopely does not discriminate against any employee or applicant because of race, creed, color, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity/expression, national origin, disability, age, genetic information, veteran status, marital status, pregnancy or related condition (including breastfeeding), or any other basis protected by law. We also consider qualified applicants with arrest or conviction records, consistent with applicable federal, state and local law.