Gameplay Designer (Creatures)

At Gardens Interactive, we believe that games have the power to connect people and foster meaningful relationships. Our studio is dedicated to creating critically acclaimed and commercially successful live-service games through a sustainable and collaborative development process.

As a Gameplay Designer focused on creatures, you will shape the heart of our world’s living inhabitants. You will design, refine, and implement systems that bring creatures to life through responsive and engaging behaviors in both combat and non-combat scenarios. Your work will ensure our worlds feel alive, dynamic, and filled with opportunities for meaningful player interaction.

A Day In The Life:

• Prototype, iterate, and maintain creature behaviors and abilities for both combat and non-combat scenarios in an online multiplayer environment.

• Own the implementation and continuous maintenance of creature behaviors using Unreal Behaviors Trees and Blackboards from prototyping to polish.

• Collaborate with engineers, artists, animators, and audio designers to bring your creature designs to the player experience.

You Will:

• Own creatures, their abilities, and their behaviors while staying aligned with gameplay design and leadership.

• Collaborate with cross-disciplinary partners to align creature design with art, narrative, 3C’s gameplay, and technical requirements.

• Balance and tune difficulty and behavior to create engaging encounters for multiplayer situations.

• Advocate for the player experience, ensuring creature interactions are fun, surprising, and memorable.

• Partner with Animation to tune movement sets and provide pathfinding logic to ensure locomotion feels grounded and purposeful.

• Act as a key bridge between Art/Animation and Engineering to troubleshoot visual state logic and optimize creature performance.

You Bring:

• Understanding of how players approach multiplayer play in order to create compelling and engaging creatures (and creature behaviors) that elevate the player experience.

• Strong collaboration skills with the ability to communicate ideas clearly and succinctly.

• Strong playtesting and iteration habits to maintain creative goals while also having a focus on how design decisions affect interpersonal player behavior and relationships.

Bonus Points:

• Extensive Unreal Engine experience, with strong proficiency in Unreal Engine Behavior Trees, Blackboards, and Blueprint Scripting.

• Experience working with and strong understanding of the Gameplay Ability System (GAS) in Unreal Engine.

• Passion for ecological design, systemic worldbuilding, or player-driven emergent gameplay.

• Love for and understanding of the animal kingdom, creature biology, and natural ecologies.

The Team:

• This role reports to the Co-Design Leads.

Please Note: Applicants must be legally authorized to work in the United States or Canada. Gardens cannot assist with work authorizations or work visas. The applicant must also be willing to work within North America time zones.

Who We Are

We're a game studio founded by the creators behind titles such as Journey, What Remains of Edith Finch, Blaseball, Dustforce, Ashen, Guild Wars 2, Firewatch, and more! Our name reflects our mission: to cultivate rich, immersive worlds that foster meaningful connections and lasting friendships. We believe in creating lush, living environments where players can engage in surprising multiplayer experiences and grow together with the support of their communities.

Our commitment to inclusivity and transparency drives us to create a work environment where every voice is heard and valued. We are a fully distributed and remote studio. We offer competitive pay, stock options, flexible non-accrual paid time off, and comprehensive benefits, including full medical, vision, dental, and 401k contributions.

We're excited to be developing our flagship title - a shared 3D fantasy adventure inspired by our favorite online gaming memories. This is the world we’re passionate about building and the world we want to experience every day.

Gardens Offers:

• Competitive Salaries and Pay Transparency

• Stock Options

• Medical, Dental, and Vision Coverage (100% for Individuals and 90% for Dependents)

• Life Insurance, Short Term & Long Term Disability, and numerous other benefits

• 401k contributions (USA) / RRSP plan + DPSP contributions (Canada)

• Paid Parental Leave

• Biannual Company Retreats

• Continued Education Allowance

• A fully-distributed studio across North American Timezones (US & Canada)

Benefits and perks listed may vary depending on the nature of your employment with Gardens and the country in which you work.

Encouragement:

We believe that diverse perspectives make our team stronger and our games better. If you’re excited about this role but don’t meet every single requirement, we encourage you to apply anyway. Studies show that marginalized groups, especially those of women and people of color, are less likely to apply unless they meet every criterion. At Gardens Interactive, we value potential, passion, and a willingness to grow. We hope you will join us in shaping the future of gaming.