We are seeking an experienced Senior Manager for the development of high quality Character Art on Valorant. Do you love collaborating to expand on a new Riot IP in the competitive shooter genre? Join us as we continue on our journey!

The Senior Manager is an industry veteran with expertise in vision and craft. They have practical experience in defining and maintaining a world-class artistic vision to support the overall game vision with a proven execution. They will coordinate a team of artists across multiple subject areas to execute on the creative and product vision . The ideal candidate has been in a Senior/Lead role on several titles and is able to bring this expertise to bear in content creation, collaboration, and communication to craft a broader player experience.

Responsibilities

• Develop the aesthetic pillars of the project, so it can be executed via defined specifications, reference materials, and style guides for environments, characters and creatures, props, lighting, and visual effects. Ensure all art assets are of the highest artistic quality and uphold the integrity of the vision of the game.
• Partner with the character leads from multiple disciplines to identify and solve artistic challenges including refining and maintaining aesthetic standards, and influencing the technical direction to best support the artistic, design, and narrative goals, and evolving the stylistic vision.
• Work with recruiting and project leadership to establish and support the growth, staffing, and resource allocation of the character art discipline over time.
• Lead a team of cross-disciplinary artists through all phases of development and champion their needs.
• Partner with Production Managers to maintain and focus the ambitions of the character art vision, including refining the process for developing estimates, crafting efficient content, and establishing clear review gates. Identify and address misalignment across Disciplines, Initiatives or Products.
• Work with the other directors, leads, and producers to support collaboration across art, animation, design, audio, engineering, and user research to reach project goals through art-driven solutions to product challenges.
• Contribute to studio and team building efforts including team training/development, recruiting, community outreach, and networking.
• Partner with Art Leadership on Valorant to maintain a cohesive vision and shared standards across the Art Organization.
• Serve as the ‘Character Art Liaison’ between the development team and publishing and merchandise departments to ensure alignment and support for non-game deliverables and products.

Requirements

• 7+ years of professional experience developing real-time 3D games or related industries
• Worked on AAA game titles in an Art Lead or Art Director role.
• Expertise in character development workflows, tools, and pipelines. 
• Build and maintain a healthy organizational structure to meet product objectives for the Character team

Desired Qualifications:

• Experience developing games in Unreal 
• Shipped at least one AAA game title in an Art Lead or Art Director role.
• Experience with multiple artist work streams; ideally this includes hands-on experience in more than one art field such as Concept Design, VFX, Lighting, Characters, Materials,  etc.
• Highly proficient communication skills and capacity to act as an ambassador between Design, Concept, 3D, Tech Art, Animation and VFX.
• Experience with the technical requirements for a variety of game platforms such PC, mobile, and console

For this role, you'll find success through craft expertise, a collaborative spirit, and decision-making that prioritizes the delight of players. We will be looking at your past studies, experience, and your personal relationship with games. If you embody player empathy and care about the experiences of players, this could be the role for you!

Our Perks:

Riot has a focus on work/life balance, shown by our open paid time off policy, in addition to other perks such as flexible work schedules. We offer medical, dental, and life insurance, parental leave for you, your spouse/domestic partner and children and a 401k with company match. Check out our benefits pages for more information.

Riot Games fosters a player and workplace experience that values teamwork embodied by the Summoner's Code and Community Code. Our culture embraces differences as a strength, and our values are the guiding principles for how we approach work. We are committed to putting diversity and inclusion (D&I) at the center of everything we do, and promoting a fair and collaborative culture where Rioters treat one another with dignity and respect. We encourage you to read more about our value of thriving together and our ongoing work to build the most inclusive company in gaming

(Los Angeles only) Base salary range between $168,000 USD - $234,000 USD + incentive compensation + equity + 401K with company match + medical, dental, vision, and life insurance + short and long-term disability + open PTO.

It's our policy to provide equal employment opportunity for all applicants and members of Riot Games, Inc. Riot Games makes reasonable accommodations for handicapped and disabled Rioters and does not unlawfully discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, age, handicap, veteran status, marital status, criminal history, or any other category protected by applicable federal and state law, including the City of Los Angeles' Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance relating to an applicant's criminal history (LAMC 189.00).