Senior Expert Gameplay Engineer (Game Development)

Location: Work from Home - CA, United States

Salary: $149,100–$275,876 annual base pay in the U.S.; incentive compensation may also apply.

Company

Activision creates and publishes interactive entertainment and video game franchises for players worldwide.

What you will do

• Design, implement, maintain, and optimize complex gameplay systems and features.
• Own gameplay initiatives from technical discovery and prototyping through implementation, iteration, optimization, and polish.
• Translate gameplay and design goals into responsive, scalable, maintainable technical solutions.
• Integrate gameplay systems with animation, AI, UI, audio, physics, networking, and other game technologies.
• Investigate cross-system technical problems, lead design reviews, and influence gameplay architecture, tools, frameworks, and reusable patterns.
• Mentor engineers through technical guidance, code reviews, design discussions, documentation, and hands-on problem solving.

Requirements

• Typically 12+ years of professional software engineering experience, including significant game development experience, or equivalent demonstrated scope and expertise.
• Experience building and shipping gameplay systems for at least one PC and/or console title.
• Deep proficiency in modern C++ and strong fundamentals in game architecture, real-time systems, performance, debugging, and optimization.
• Ability to independently own complex gameplay systems from concept through implementation, optimization, and polish.
• Ability to diagnose and solve ambiguous technical problems with limited direction while balancing player experience, performance, maintainability, and delivery priorities.
• Experience translating gameplay concepts and design requirements into technical solutions and understanding gameplay fundamentals that make systems responsive, intuitive, and enjoyable.
• Experience collaborating with game designers and engineering and non-engineering disciplines.
• Ability to mentor engineers, influence technical decisions, improve team technical quality, and communicate inclusively.

Nice to have

• Experience shipping multiplayer or online gameplay and working with replication, networking, and multiplayer architecture.
• Experience with AI, navigation, physics, animation systems, or character technology.
• Experience building gameplay frameworks or reusable technology used by multiple teams or systems.
• Experience with gameplay scripting or other methods that enable rapid designer iteration.

Culture & Benefits

• Remote work from California within the United States.
• Medical, dental, vision, healthcare spending, life, disability, and related insurance programs, subject to eligibility.
• 401(k) with company match, tuition reimbursement, charitable donation matching, and paid holidays, vacation, sick time, and leave programs.
• Mental health, wellbeing, fitness, game discount, legal service, identity protection, and other voluntary benefit programs.
• Relocation assistance may be available if the company requires a geographic move for the job.