Lead Technical Designer

House of How Games LLC.; United States; Remote; USD 110,000 - 150,000; Full time

Job summary

House of How Games LLC is seeking a Lead Technical Designer to drive features from prototype to ship for a lighthearted tactics title. You will collaborate with artists, designers, and programmers to ensure gameplay feels polished and fun.

You will own detailed design documentation, balance systems, and prototype new concepts in Unreal, with Blueprint and occasional C++ adjustments. The team operates remotely across North America, with Seattle as a base.

Qualifications

• 3+ years of professional game development as a Technical Designer.
• Experience on a AAA or high end AA game on PC or console.
• Heavy experience in Unreal; capable of jumping into C++ as needed.

Responsibilities

• Drive gameplay and features in collaboration with artists, designers, and programmers.
• Prototype diverse systems in Blueprint; interpolate into C++ when needed.
• Design features in collaboration with programmers, game designers, and other teams.
• Create detailed and easy-to-use project documentation.
• Proactively identify workflow issues and offer solutions.
• Attend playtest sessions and address issues.
• Assist with pitching the game to publishers and at conventions.

Skills

Unreal Engine

Blueprint visual scripting

C++ familiarity

Prototype design

Game balancing

Documentation

Scripting languages

Version control (Git / Perforce)

Tools

Unreal Engine

Perforce

Git

Job description

We believe that a universe without fun would be a pretty dull place to exist... and that games are the best medium in the world to provide that fun. We love games which is why we make games. We make games to be a part of providing that outlet for escape, competition, exploration, social connection and so much more to a global audience of 3B+ players and growing.

We believe in authentic leadership, real conversations, making decisions, learning from mistakes but always continuing to move forward. We don't want big company politics. We just want to do our best work with good people and have fun doing what we love.

We believe that our team performs best when everyone shows up as their authentic full self and we strive to empower everyone in the studio to be a game-maker. We encourage everyone to have an entrepreneurial mindset and we foster continuous learning and innovation.

In a time of so much industry consolidation, House of How is proud to be fully independent. We are based out of Seattle, Washington with remote game-makers all across North America, from British Columbia to New England, and we have a satellite studio in Boden, Sweden.

Starting out as colleagues at Microsoft Games, our leads worked with each other for years before setting out on a new adventure together. From humble beginnings, we grew slowly and carefully to ensure we could control our own destiny. We are now at 50 people and growing rapidly as our industry reputation is bringing more and more projects to the studio. Come join our team and be part of the amazing growth story of House of How Games and help us to entertain the planet!

Job Description

House of How is looking for a Lead Technical Designer. As an integral part of our team, your responsibilities include driving products to completion, prototyping, balancing, documenting, and designing features in collaboration with programmers and game designers. You will own features and drive quality experiences to make our games great!

You will join us as a Lead Technical Designer on a lighthearted, whimsical, internally developed tactics title.

Responsibilities

• Drive gameplay, collaborating with artists, animators, and programmers to make our gameplay feel great.
• Implement a variety of prototype systems in Blueprint, ideally being able to jump a bit into C++ as well.
• Design features in collaboration with programmers, game designers, and other teams.
• Create detailed and easy-to-use project documentation.
• Proactively identify workflow issues and offer solutions.
• Attend playtest sessions and be solution-oriented to any problems encountered.
• Assist with pitching the game to prospective publishers and at conventions.

Requirements

• 3+ years of professional game development as a Technical Designer.
• Worked on a AAA or high end AA game on PC or console
• Heavy experience in Unreal, as part of a prototype team you will need to be able to jump into many aspects of the engine.
• Ability to create detailed design documentation.
• Capacity to balance and tune multiple game elements and features.
• Experience in prototyping multiple game features simultaneously.
• Strong analytical and formal thinking, able to break problems down in their key variables and identify the relations between them.
• Capability to process, understand and implement feedback.
• Experience working with scripting languages, or visual scripting systems.
• Comfort in source control systems such as Perforce or Git.
• Written and spoken English fluency.

Bonus Qualifications

• A portfolio of work where you are ready to discuss what you did, and why you did it.
• Side skills in Programming, Art, Audio, Writing, etc. If you have any gaming related side skills, please let us know!
• You’re located and authorized to work in Latin America or Sweden.