Senior / Principal Combat Designer (AAA, Open World)

Responsibilities

Lightspeed LA is looking for a highly creative and technical Combat Designer who has a passion for building AAA open world games. This role is responsible for driving core combat systems for the player and enemy AI. As a Senior Combat Designer, you will collaborate with Art, Design, and Tech to bring cutting edge AAA combat experiences to life.

Required Skills:

• 5+ years of experience in gameplay design, including senior or lead experience
• Extensive experience building combat systems for player characters and / or enemies
• Establish core combat functionality and pipeline with designers, engineers, and animators
• Drive the vision, prototyping, implementation, and fine tuning of combat systems from concept to completion including controls, balance, animation implementation and tuning, environmental interaction, sound effects, and visual effects
• Proven ability to implement and troubleshoot complex character logic through scripting
• Design compelling AI archetypes, gameplay scenarios, and encounters that cover a dynamic range of intensity and complexity
• Strong written and verbal communication skills with the ability to convey difficult and abstract concepts to all disciplines
• Collaborate with others to establish and maintain high quality design practices and metrics
• Partner closely with other disciplines to ensure that combat systems complement narrative, art, technical and design decisions

Preferred Qualifications

• Strong technical knowledge of scripting languages or code is preferred
• Possess an extensive knowledge of competing products, a deep understanding of the complex overlap between combat and open world gameplay systems and an expert grasp of combat timing and feel.
• Experience with modern game engines and visual scripting (Unreal, Unity, etc.)
• A passion for mentoring designers and leading by example
• Shipped at least one AAA title from inception to finish