Game Designer

Location: Redwood City / US Remote

At Maxis, we thrive on outrageous thinking. It’s the fuel that inspires the best games in the world. We’re innovators and great storytellers. But it’s not just about amazing your peers – it’s about amazing yourself and our fans. Take risks. Collaborate with brilliant minds and dare to dream big. Together, we can change the way millions play every day.

As a Designer on The Sims, you’ll be working with a large (but tight-knit) team of enthusiastic industry craftspeople from all walks of life. Your job will be to use your passion and knowledge to design and create player-first experiences from end to end, to surprise and delight millions of gamers around the world.

You will be reporting into a studio Development Director.

Responsibilities

Serve as an advocate, representing the Design team to the rest of the dev team.
Help define best practices for the team.
Be a proactive member of the Design team, brainstorming and writing designs, and providing feedback to other designers.
Become a proactive mentor to more junior members of the team.
Have a depth of knowledge across a majority of systems, being able to own entire pillars for a pack and train/support the team on its features.
Define gameplay experience goals for designs, and tune features to meet those goals.
Iterate on designs based on internal/external playtests, game metrics, team input and community feedback.
Be resourceful and solve problems using the tools and time/scope available to efficiently craft unique and fun experiences for players.
Communicate and collaborate with all team disciplines, including artists, animators, modelers, engineers and producers to get buy-in from the team and drive a project from initial design to final production.
Become an expert on the game and our community, drawing from our large, varied player base and our past games to make and defend intelligent design choices going forward.
Have an eye for improving process and efficiency to make life easier for the Design team.

Requirements

At least 7 years of game design experience on a video game development team.
Excellent creative, analytical and organization skills with proven ability to write and maintain detailed design documentation throughout a project life cycle.
Open-minded, progressive thinking while remaining flexible, energetic and driven to overcome challenges with practical solutions.
Strong communication and inter-personal skills, with ability to champion a design and get the team excited to work on it.
Exceptional time-management practices.
Ability to learn and become proficient in a variety of proprietary development tools.
Strong sense of ownership and responsibility.
Design and implementation experience with game features which focus on open-ended player creativity.
Effective at working both autonomously and in groups of different profiles.
Knowledge of and enthusiasm for gaming: playing, deconstructing and creating.
Experience with games in The Sims PC franchise and other simulation games.
Desired experience: Shipped a AAA HD title.
Desired experience: Bachelor’s Degree or equivalent.
Desired experience: Comfortable with MS suite (Word, Excel, Powerpoint, etc.), Google Docs, Visio, JIRA, online collaboration suites such as Confluence.

About EA

At Electronic Arts, we exist to Inspire the World to Play. We create extraordinary new game experiences for our millions of players everywhere by bringing together talented people that combine creativity, innovation, and passion. We know that our strength lies in the diversity of our people. We immerse our employees into an inclusive culture, and provide opportunities for learning and leading that allow them to do the most impactful and rewarding work of their careers. We put our people first. We provide comprehensive benefit packages with a focus on health and wellbeing to support your needs and help you balance your career and personal life. We provide access to dynamic and collaborative work environments, opportunities to connect and contribute through our Employee Resource Groups, and support for a balanced life with paid time off and maternity and paternity leave, plus free video games and so much more! Electronic Arts is an equal opportunity employer. All employment decisions are made without regard to race, color, national origin, ancestry, sex, gender, gender identity or expression, sexual orientation, age, genetic information, religion, disability, medical condition, pregnancy, marital status, family status, veteran status, or any other characteristic protected by law. Electronic Arts also makes workplace accommodations for qualified individuals with disabilities as required by applicable law.