Position Summary

As Lead Narrative Designer, you will guide a talented team of writers and narrative designers in bringing a cast of vibrant characters and their quests and adventures to life! You will take a strong narrative vision to the next level by creating evocative dialogue, compelling scenarios and objectives, multi-faceted, diverse characters, and time-bending, branching narrative content.

You have the ability and experience to lead and mentor your team, motivating, inspiring, and providing support as they craft narrative content that aligns with the creative vision.

About Us

Our mission is to craft retro-infused JRPGs that awaken cherished childhood memories. Our growing studio is assembling a dream team of talent from across the globe to build the games you’ve always dreamed of growing up. Join us on this epic quest to make fun, narrative-rich games in an inclusive, supportive, and fun studio environment!

You’ll be working on Threads of Time, a 2.5D JRPG inspired by Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy where you get to travel from the pre-historic era to the end of time!

• Become part of a veteran team that has included legendary developers who led iconic titles such as Xenoblade Chronicles, Legend of Mana, and more
• 4 weeks paid vacation (1 week of which is taken in late December)
• Collaborative environment with opportunities to contribute to the game’s creative design and take ownership of features
• Competitive salary and benefits including medical, dental, vision, and life insurance
• Opportunities to help you strengthen your skills or learn something new
• A workplace that appreciates and values diversity and inclusivity

Responsibilities

• Oversee and mentor a team of writers and narrative designers, providing leadership and constructive feedback to achieve quality
• Contribute creatively to the writing process, seamlessly integrating narrative elements into gameplay and writing from various voices and perspectives
• Collaborate with the Design Director to ensure alignment between game design and narrative, and with the Art Director on character and world development for a cohesive player experience
• Lead the narrative process from initial plot development to managing localization pipelines
• Ensure dialogue is appropriate for voice acting, and lead the casting and voice recording sessions
• Conceive scenarios, quests, and objectives that are tied to larger story goals
• Write and edit character dialogue, barks, objective text, lore, and other narrative content
• Effectively communicate with engineers to ensure seamless technical implementation of narrative tools and pipelines
• Collaborate closely with production to create a robust narrative production plan and monitor progress effectively to meet project milestones
• Maintain a story bible that includes game dialogue documentation, plot variables, character information, backstory, and cinematic handoff plans

Qualifications

• At least 7 years of professional game writing experience
• A love and understanding of JRPGs
• Experience in creative writing, plot design, and writing dialogue
• Experience managing a team of writers and narrative designers
• An understanding of story structure and its impact on interactive narrative
• Willingness to work under strong direction while maintaining creativity
• Highly organized – the ability to manage multiple story arcs and their relationships with each other
• Strong communication, listening, and interpersonal skills
• Shipped a minimum of 1 video game as a writer, with a preference for projects like RPGs that are highly character and plot-driven

Pluses:

• A resident of Ontario or Quebec, Canada 
• Familiarity with Unreal Engine

Salary: $90,000 - $120,000

Maybe you think that your experience is not where it should be? Or you don’t meet every requirement listed in this job description? Studies have shown that women and people of colour are less likely to apply for jobs if they don’t think they meet every qualification. But we feel that creating meaningful work means embracing different perspectives, which is why at Riyo Games we are focused on building an equitable, diverse, and inclusive studio. If your experience is not perfectly aligned with every requirement in this job description, but you’re interested in this position, we encourage you to apply anyway. We simply want to know what makes you special!

Riyo Games welcomes and encourages applications from candidates with disabilities. Accommodations are available on request for candidates taking part in the selection process. If you require disability-related accommodation during the recruitment process, please email [email protected]. We will consult with all applicants who request disability-related accommodation during the recruitment process to ensure that the accommodation provided takes into account the applicant's individual accessibility needs.

Please note although this is a full-time remote position, applicants must reside in Canada. Thank you, we look forward to hearing from you!

Position Summary

Riyo Games is currently looking for a Senior Systems Designer who is passionate about JRPGs to join our team. You will leverage strong creative, analytical and communication skills to create and iterate the systems that power our JRPG, Threads of Time. Combat and progression are at the heart of our game, and you will play a pivotal role in crafting a rewarding, engaging, and memorable experience for players.

About Us

Our mission is to craft retro-infused JRPGs that awaken cherished childhood memories. Our growing studio is assembling a dream team of talent from across the globe to build the games you’ve always dreamed of growing up. Join us on this epic quest to make fun, narrative-rich games in an inclusive, supportive and fun studio environment!

You’ll be working on Threads of Time, a 2.5D JRPG inspired by Chrono Trigger and Final Fantasy where you get to travel from the pre-historic era to the end of time!

• Become part of a veteran team that includes legendary developers who have worked on iconic titles such as Xenoblade Chronicles, Secret of Mana, and more
• 4 weeks paid vacation (1 week of which is taken in late December)
• Collaborative environment with opportunities to contribute to the game’s creative design and take ownership of features
• Competitive salary and benefits including medical, dental, vision, and life insurance
• Opportunities to help you strengthen your skills or learn something new
• Workplace that appreciates and values diversity and inclusivity

Responsibilities: 

• Create combat and progression systems that answer the needs of the Creative and Design Directors about the targeted experience for the player
• Bring your designs through every phase of development from concept to finish, using feedback and testing to refine them
• Hold and communicate the vision for your work to collaborators in other departments
• Create new systems and features while balancing and tweaking existing ones
• Work closely with the programming team to implement and iterate designs
• Collaborate with art, code, audio, animation, and visual effects to deliver combat systems that epitomize the creative vision of the game
• Design detailed progression systems and tune them for specific goals
• Research retro and modern JRPG design conventions to ensure authenticity of the experience
• Work within Unreal Engine 5 to implement and tune combat and progression systems
• Establish and enforce design practices, constraints, and metrics
• Standardize, document, and communicate game systems to the team. Regularly update documentation to offer useful reference for the whole team

Requirements:

• At least 5+ years' experience in the games industry working as a combat/systems designer, shipping at least one title
• A passion for JRPGs is a must
• Proactive and able to own design areas from initial creation through to implementation
• Strong analytical and problem-solving skills
• Familiarity and proficiency with scripting
• Strong communication and interpersonal skills
• Organized and able to write concise documentation
• Self-motivated, with the ability to prioritize and deliver quality work within deadlines
• Able to recognize great game feel and how to manifest player fantasy into gameplay mechanics

Pluses:

• Resident of Ontario or Quebec 

Compensation:

$90,000 - $110,000 CAD

Maybe you think that your experience is not where it should be? Or you don’t meet every requirement listed in this job description? Studies have shown that women and people of colour are less likely to apply to jobs if they don’t think they meet every qualification. But we feel that creating meaningful work means embracing different perspectives, which is why at Riyo Games we are focused on building an equitable, diverse and inclusive studio. If your experience is not perfectly aligned with every requirement in this job description, but you’re interested in this position, we encourage you to apply anyway. We simply want to know what makes you special!

Riyo Games welcomes and encourages applications from candidates with disabilities. Accommodations are available on request for candidates taking part in the selection process. If you require disability-related accommodation during the recruitment process, please email [email protected]. We will consult with all applicants who request disability-related accommodation during the recruitment process to ensure that the accommodation provided takes into account the applicant's individual accessibility needs.

Please note although this is a full-time remote position, applicants must reside in Canada. Thank you, we look forward to hearing from you!