We have a variety of extraordinary people from all over the world working at Abstraction like athletes in all kinds of shape and forms, F1 fans, music lovers, binge-watchers, video gamers, family people, singles, happy people etc. You will find a new colleague to connect with.

Abstraction is a creative game development studio established in 2007 in The Netherlands with a no-compromise attitude that delivers cutting-edge results. Renowned for taking on technically demanding projects and providing support teams for AAA publishers, Abstraction does not shy away from a challenge and has delivered 200+ SKU’s across 60 games over the last 14 years. The company is also engaged with creative co-development and DLC projects and is producing an unannounced internal game based on an original IP.

Our video game development studio is proud to count as its partners, companies such as Bioware/EA, 343/Microsoft, Funcom, Sega, Paradox Interactive, Snail Games, Perfect World, Mythical Games and Aspyr Media to name but a few.

Abstraction’s HQ is based close to Eindhoven, The Netherlands but has a multi-skilled and multi-national team of 80+ amazing game programmers, game artists, game designers, and game producers located around the world.

The company is privately owned, and its executive team has a combined experience of over 100 years in the games industry.

Day in the life

As Art Director your prime responsibility is to establish and guard throughout production the visual style and quality for our games.

In close liaise with your team and the producer you make sure that product requirements are met and translated into visual design that is clearly communicated towards the art team.

You are proactive, responsible, and highly self-motivated and use this to inspire your art team. You are also a hands-on problem solver and a mentor with a strong drive to improve your team as well as the tools and workflow.

Your responsibilities:

Responsible for establishing and documenting the art style and quality that meet product requirements.
Direct, mentor and train the Art Team Leads and Artists.
Manage the art team's personal growth and goals.
Guide the implementation of the Art Style through toolchains and workflow.
Oversee and advise on art workflow and toolchain setup and maintenance.
Act as liaise between art and code.
Act as a benchmark for the in-house artists.
Advise Project management on Art and Art Team related issues like planning and dependencies.
Participate in recruitment by screening and interviewing art candidates.
Along with the producer liaise with Clients or publishers to ensure Artistic the goals and requirements are met.
Participate in internal assessment/review of future projects.

Must-have experience and skills On day one we'll expect you to have:

5+ years of experience in the game industry and at least one year as an Art Director or an Art Lead.
Shipped multiple games on more than one platform (one of them being a console).
Experience with multiple game engines (and their limitations), 2D art tools, 3D software.
Familiarity with bug tracking software and version management systems.
Proactive, responsible, and highly self-motivated.
Critical thinking, time management, and organizational capabilities.
Able to anticipate & result oriented.
Able to balance time and quality.
Excellent communication & interpersonal skills.
Excellent written and verbal communication skills in English.
Highly Artistic and creative.
Passion for Games.

What separates the best from the rest Bonus if you have previous experience managing out-sourced art assets production.

Work location and time zone

Fully remote during and post COVID-19 pandemic or onsite
Working hours are within the European time zone (CET).

Team culture Embrace our core values:

Go beyond boundaries!

Use a “First Principles” approach.
Take nothing at face value.
Define your own path around obstacles.
Embrace ideas that almost anyone would consider outrageous.

Excel!

Perform exceptionally well.
Strive for symmetry (or intentional dissymmetry), beauty and polish.
Craft meticulously. Don’t stop when “it’s good enough…”.
Move mountains.

Be nice!

Apply the Most Respectful Interpretation approach with one another.
Maintain a safe environment for us, our partners and consumers.
Be transparent and do not keep up appearances.
Be candid and call out someone’s mistake but be nice about it. If you haven’t learned how to do this yet, learn it now.
Be respectful of other people’s time. Be punctual, prepared, and brief.

Grow!

Seek hard problems to solve.
Be better than yesterday.
Step out of your comfort zone often, take risks, make mistakes and learn from them.
Fail fast to succeed sooner.
Challenge each other to keep growing.
Blame none other but yourself, embrace failure and move on.