Principal/Lead Mission Designer (Campaign)

The role

You will build and standardize craft-quality for single-player campaign missions. You will shape critical path and side missions in an open-world setting through strategic leadership and hands-on design.

What you will do

• Provide direction, mentorship, and constructive feedback to mission designers.
• Partner with narrative leadership to improve main story campaign flow and execution.
• Collaborate with senior creative and development leadership to establish priorities.
• Lead through vision and execution while remaining hands-on with mission design.
• Bring complex narrative concepts to life within mission experiences.
• Champion innovative approaches to storytelling, gameplay, pacing, and player agency.
• Identify opportunities to leverage open-world systems and mechanics.
• Work with co-development partners across multiple time zones.
• Partner with production to problem-solve and assess scope.
• Champion a culture of creative collaboration, experimentation, iteration, and continuous improvement.

Required qualifications

• 8+ years of experience in mission design.
• Track record of contributing to or leading the development of high-quality AAA games.
• Deep expertise in mission design, including mission structure, pacing, and the relationship between narrative and gameplay.
• Expert knowledge of action mission principles including encounter design, combatant behaviors and level design/layout requirements.
• Demonstrated ability to establish and communicate a creative vision, influence design direction, and drive complex work from concept through implementation.
• Strong understanding of storytelling and narrative design, particularly within open-world, single-player experiences.
• Experience providing creative direction, mentorship, and guidance to other designers.
• Exceptional communication, collaboration, and problem-solving skills.
• A strong creative point of view, paired with flexibility and judgment to evolve ideas through collaboration and iteration.

Nice to have

• Experience leading or mentoring multidisciplinary mission design teams on AAA productions.
• Experience shipping multiple AAA titles, particularly story-driven, open-world games.
• Experience designing missions that make meaningful use of systemic gameplay and player-driven experiences.
• Experience with Unreal Engine 4 or 5.
• Experience working with external co-development partners.
• Experience establishing mission design workflows, best practices, and standards across a development team.

Benefits

• Paid time off
• Sick time
• Company holidays
• Parental leave
• Medical/dental/vision insurance
• Life insurance
• Disability insurance
• 401(k)

About the company

absurdventures