Mission Designer

Absurd Ventures•Santa Monica, CA

4d•Onsite

About The Position

We are seeking a Mission Designer to create memorable missions combining strong storytelling with action gameplay for a new open-world IP built in Unreal Engine 5. This is a hands-on design and implementation role on a multidisciplinary team, creating story missions—including critical-path and side missions—and single-player campaign features. The Mission Designer will develop engaging, varied missions; help improve team practices and iteration; build mission systems and features; and use existing open-world systems to create dynamic experiences that respond to player choices and actions. The role also involves giving design feedback, documenting missions and tools, and making changes based on internal and external playtesting data. This is a full-time, on-site position in Santa Monica, California. The base salary range is $100,000 to $115,000 per year. Benefits for regular full-time employees include vacation and sick time, company holidays, parental leave, medical, dental, and vision insurance, life and disability insurance, and 401(k) matching. Certain roles may also be eligible for bonus and equity.

Requirements

At least 1–2 years of experience building mission content, ideally for an open-world game.
Excellent communication and interpersonal skills.
Innovative thinking and creative problem-solving skills, with the ability to thrive in a collaborative team environment.
A high-quality portfolio showcasing previous game scripting, encounter design, or mission design work.
Strong understanding of storytelling and narrative design.

Nice To Haves

Experience building game-wide systems or features.
Experience with level design, blockout, or world-building.
Experience with Unreal Engine 4 or Unreal Engine 5.
Experience working with co-development partners.
Experience working on an open-world title.

Responsibilities

Own implementation of engaging, diverse, innovative missions in a story-driven open-world game.
Work with the Lead Mission Designer to develop best practices and robust solutions that enable faster team iteration.
Challenge existing approaches to open-world mission design and identify opportunities for change.
Build new mission systems that can help define core features across the game.
Use existing open-world systems and mechanics to create dynamic, unpredictable mission experiences that adapt to player choices and actions.
Provide feedback to other mission designers to improve design and storytelling quality.
Create documentation for missions, mission tools, and mission-related game features.
Design and implement changes based on internal and external playtesting data.