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AI Gameplay Engineer

San Ramon, CA

Welcome to Striking Distance Studios!

Driven by people. Inspired by challenges. Relentless to deliver creative excellence.

At the intersection of art, design and technology lies Striking Distance Studios. We are a AAA development studio within the San Ramon Hills of the San Francisco Bay Area. With the release of our first title, The Callisto Protocol, we are excited to continue to grow our team.

Here at Striking Distance Studios it is amazing people, an immersive experience and a passion for excellence that drives us each day. We are looking for people who push themselves creatively and learn with every new challenge. We give you the setting and the opportunity to do work you are proud of. We’re looking for the best to come join us and become part of a world-class team.

To us excellence is not a skill, but an attitude!

 

What we are looking for:

Striking Distance Studios is looking for a Gameplay AI Engineer to work in a cooperative, cross-disciplinary team environment to implement gameplay features and systems within our games. 

 

Responsibilities:

  • Work across disciplines to build, refactor and maintain a variety of robust, flexible, and well-architected AI features.
  • Work with design team to prototype and implement AI behaviors that empower the fun.
  • Implement enemies, NPCs or any kind of AI managed characters.
  • Work with gameplay engineers to integrate developed AI systems.
  • Implement optimizations in perception systems and decision-making systems to make the AI performant.
  • Work on navigation and pathfinding systems.
  • Create and maintain technical design documents.
  • Delve into code written by other engineers and take ownership of existing systems as needed.
  • Keep current on technological developments and advancements.
  • Research and develop coding techniques and algorithms.
  • Collaborate with technology director on technical design and feature roll out.
  • Write clear, maintainable, portable, and highly performant code.
  • Communicate accurate status updates to your team leads, producers, and QA regarding tasks/features you are responsible for.
  • Adhere to team coding standards and best practices.
  • Foster a culture of open, honest, and respectful communication across all disciplines.

 

Qualifications:

  • Bachelor's degree in software engineering, computer science, or equivalent.
  • At least 3 years of games industry experience and preferably 2 years or more in a similar role.
  • At least 1 year of experience with Unreal Engine 5.
  • Experience shipping games on current generation consoles (PS5 or XSX) and PC.
  • Ability to be self-directed, focused and detail oriented.
  • C++ skills.
  • Knowledge on blueprints and AI decision making tools (Unreal behavior trees, utility AI, etc.).
  • Knowledge of navigation and pathfinding systems.
  • 3D math skills.
  • Advanced verbal and written communications skills.
  • A demonstrable love / passion for playing and making video games.
  • A highly communicative and collaborative disposition.

 

In California, the expected salary range for this position is $95,000-$135,000. The listed expected salary range represents a good faith estimate and the actual pay may depend on a variety of job-related factors that can include experience, education, skills, and location.

Striking Distance Studios provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws. This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation and training.

Due to recent scams, our recruiters will only reach out to you via @sds.com, @krafton.com or @pubg.com. If you received an email and are unsure you can always email recruiting@sds.com. 

 

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