Lab42 is a best in class cross-platform game developer based in the UK. Now in our sixth-year, our headcount has grown to nearly 50 experienced people supported by a veteran management team with backgrounds from Activision, Codemasters and EA.

It’s an exciting time to be part of the Sumo family, winners of the Develop: Star Awards 2019 Best Studio and GI Biz 2020 Best Places to Work; big things are on the horizon and we want you to be part of our continued journey. Join us!

Lab42 is made up of a diverse mix of fantastic people, although sometimes, some groups are still under-represented. We are working to remove obstacles that can make it difficult for those groups to progress their careers in the games industry. We welcome applications from under-represented people in the gaming industry, including, but not limited to BAME, LGBQT+, women, people with physical disabilities, neurodiversity or mental health issues, and parents or carers.

What is the job?

Lab42 Games are looking to recruit a Principal Programmer to lead technical decisions and tackle the most challenging technical problems. From estimating projects to writing code, and from designing code architecture to creating coding standards, a Principal Programmer will have the opportunity to shape the technical direction of projects and the studio as they work with a range of highly regarded IPs and external partners on many different platforms.

Who are we looking for?

This is a principal level role, with a strong expectation of many years of experience within the games industry specifically. In addition to keeping a handle on the technical direction of projects and the studio, you will be expected to be hands-on with code, implementing features and being involved with bug fixing on a day to day basis.

Experience of shipping games products as a senior member of a team is essential, as you will need to be versed in guiding projects to completion by working with Lead Programmers or Producers while keeping an eye on the big picture. You will be relied upon to be pro-active in looking for technical solutions to potential problems with code before they cause lasting issues. You will need to be self-motivated and capable of working without direct supervision while collaborating with your team, but you will be expected to feed back periodically to the Technical and Development Directors.

You will:

Write high quality code that can be delivered on time
Work on a wide variety of projects and tasks in various engines and languages
Contribute to a programming team by planning and directing your own work and working with a Lead Programmer or Producer to set the work for the rest of your team
Liaise with other disciplines and teams within the studio and external partners to facilitate development
Contribute to ensuring that build pipelines are in place to deliver regular, testable builds
Have the opportunity to interview candidates for programming roles within the studio
Report to the Technical Director and assist in drawing up policy and best practices
Adhere to and enforce programming best practices and standards

The role requires:

Experience of leading the technical direction of games projects
Multiple years of experience working in games in a senior capacity
Excellent knowledge of C++ and C#
Experience of working with other languages like Java and Objective-C, or scripting languages like Lua or Python
An understanding of working with the command line
A working understanding of different consoles and/or game streaming platforms, in addition to PC development
Experience with build systems (e.g. Jenkins, TeamCity)
Experience of writing technical documentation, to document investigations, approaches, and features

What we would like to see, but is not essential:

Shipped titles in Unreal Engine and Unity
Experience of working with clients directly to ascertain their needs
Experience of implementing automation for building projects and code
Shipped titles on mobile

Why should you work at Lab42?

Lab42 was formed 6 years ago with just one developer, and we have grown organically to over 40 staff over those. Now part of the Sumo Group we’re based in the heart of Royal Leamington Spa; a thriving town with a bustling game-development scene

With an exceptional engineering team who bring experience of working directly on dozens of titles across a range of platforms, we are ideally set up to take on the responsibility of full SKU development, adaptations & ports from platform to platform and focused co-development where our adaptable production techniques and processes enable us to dovetail with our partners.

In conjunction with World Snooker Tour we internally developed the officially licensed, photo-realistic sports/simulation Snooker19, the first in an ongoing game franchise, for all major Consoles and PC. That’s in addition to providing a range of development services and special projects to a growing client list which features Activision, Paradox, Sega, Klei Entertainment, Aspyr, Magmic, Ripstone and WayForward.

We are a small, dedicated bunch with experience, drive, passion and creativity. Lab42 has a flexible working environment that make this a relaxed and friendly place to work. By prioritising the happiness and wellbeing of our staff we have been able to hire many industry veterans, and we are proud to have one of the lowest rates of staff attrition in game development. Recently we have been nominated for and received several “Best Place to Work” awards for our focus on fostering a happy work environment with strong no-crunch policies. As part of Sumo Group, Lab42 offers a range of competitive and customisable benefits, and works with several industry leading partners to provide our staff with the opportunity to work on top-quality projects.