Senior Live Ops Designer

November 30, 2024

Since 2016, Sumo Nottingham has been known for crafting inclusive, innovative action and racing titles for console and PC. Bringing together industry veterans with the best new talent in the industry, the studio delivered Team Sonic Racing in 2019 and is now working on a diverse and exciting mix of new projects.

The studio’s vision is to create AAA games with innovation, character and accessibility at their very core – strengths that have seen them named as one of the ‘Best Places to Work’ in the Best Companies regional table for the East Midlands.

Day in the life of a Senior Live Ops Designer:

As part of the design team on a brand-new horror title, you will own the design of game systems with a focus on ensuring all systems support the live ops goals for the title. To achieve this, you will also build and maintain a picture of how all game systems fit together to achieve the intended experience, providing feedback to ensure everything works together as intended.

In this role, you will collaborate with other Designers and other departments, and take direction from the Project Design Director and Lead Product Manager on creative and live ops goals for the game. You will act as an evangelist the live ops experience and game design more broadly to the rest of the team.

Day to day, you will provide clear, concise documentation outlining vision and specification for features, seek out feedback to refine your work, and ensure they align with other systems and features in the game. You will also provide Designers with feedback on other game systems to ensure they support the overall long-term live ops plan for the project.

Once designs are approved, you will act as owner for their implementation, overseeing a sub-team working on the feature and providing guidance and feedback to ensure their delivery to meet time and quality goals. You may also be required to mentor more junior Designers.

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Please note, you will need to be UK based for this role (onsite, hybrid or remote basis offered within the UK).

What you need to do this job:

• Experience working on at least one live ops/GAAS title.

• A strong grasp of game design principles and in particular game design within live ops.

• It will be a bonus if you've got experience working on one or more multiplayer games or experience working on PC/Console titles.

• A passion for the horror genre would be ideal.

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The Interview Process:

At Sumo Nottingham, we want a holistic and engaging interview process that allows us to get to know you, your skills and your potential. For the Senior Live Ops Designer role, we have a 3 stage interview process:

1st Stage: Here we will talk with you about your experience and skills, our expectations in the role and ask some competency based questions. There will, of course, be opportunities for you to ask questions!

2nd Stage: This is a great chance for you to meet some more of the team here at Sumo Nottingham and will be more of a culture based interview.

3rd Stage: This will be your final interview and will be a great chance to ask any questions regarding the role, project and team. This interview will be a mixture of competency and culture!

What’s in it for you?

Sumo understands the importance of having control over your benefits. That's why we offer a flexible, personalised benefits package designed to meet your unique needs, no matter where you are in your career.

My Money: Annual bonus, flexible benefits allowance (to purchase add-on benefits marked*), salary sacrifice pension, employee referral scheme (up to £1,000), financial/home buying consultations, workplace ISA and other schemes for tech loans, cars, bicycles and much more!

My Lifestyle: Flexible working, 21 free choice days holiday, bank holidays, birthday off, a duvet day raising to 4 with service, Christmas shutdown (Christmas Eve to New Year), options to buy or sell +5/-5 days annual leave*.

My Health and Wellbeing: Dental insurance, income protection, life assurance, BUPA private healthcare*, leading EAP programs (Remote GP, Mental Health and Physio appointments), critical illness cover*, health cash plan* and funded flu vaccines/eye tests.

My Development: Structured Personal Development tool, regular appraisals, annual salary reviews, access to Udemy learning platform, 5 learning days per annum (1 can be used as a volunteer day), award-winning L&D team and yearly attendance to the Sumo Developers Conference (link to video).

Extra Perks: A variety of in-studio perks, regular care packages, regular studio days out (family welcome), studio-led social activities (game jams, yoga, life drawing and more), sabbaticals (at 10 years service) and an annual gaming subscription.

*These benefits are part of our flexible benefits options and are opt-in selections.

Inclusion and Belonging at Sumo Digital:

We are dedicated to growing a sustainable business that provides security to our people while delivering a first-class experience to our partners and players.

As a people business, the success of our people is the success of our company. We prioritise taking care of them with a focus on supporting them, nurturing their talent and providing a healthy, friendly, enriching, creative and safe environment in which to work.

Sumo's employee diversity group, PRISM, exists to promote diversity, inclusion, equity, equality & wellbeing across the company and plays a key role in Sumo's ongoing goal of fostering environments where all employees feel safe, welcome & represented.

Our charitable and community initiatives provide support for meaningful causes that matter to our employees, clients and partners.

We continue to work to improve diversity in our recruitment and promotion processes, and to actively encourage people from marginalised groups to consider a career in the games industry.

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Common Interview Questions And Answers

1. HOW DO YOU PLAN YOUR DAY?

This is what this question poses: When do you focus and start working seriously? What are the hours you work optimally? Are you a night owl? A morning bird? Remote teams can be made up of people working on different shifts and around the world, so you won't necessarily be stuck in the 9-5 schedule if it's not for you...

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This is a great question because it shows your comfort level with technology, which is very important for a remote worker because you will be working with technology over time...

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