Staff Software Engineer - VALORANT, Core Services

Riot engineers bring deep knowledge of specific technical areas but also value the opportunity to work in many broader domains. As a Staff Software Engineer at Riot, you’ll also dive into projects that focus on team cohesiveness and cross-team goals. You’ll lead without authority and provide other engineers with a clear illustration of extraordinary engineering.VALORANT is Riot’s take on a character-based tactical shooter (for more info on VALORANT click here!).

As a Staff Software Engineer on the VALORANT team, you’ll drive the direction of how VALORANT builds, delivers and operates its global services platform. You will lead the development of new services, drive evergreen improvements to existing services, create standards and frameworks to improve services development across VALORANT, and improve the tools and pipelines used to ship and operate those services. You will work closely with technical teams in Tencent to improve services delivery and operations in China, closing divergences in developer experience and platform behavior between Tencent and Riot regions.

This is a full-time role, based in Sydney, Australia.

• Lead development of VALORANT’s services platform as part of a distributed team across Sydney and the US.
• Guide the technical design, development and operation of services, ensuring long-term maintainability and scalability.
• Champion the technical vision for your team with production and other engineering teams.
• Advocate for players, your team, and internal development customers when deciding what to build and why. Coordinate with other teams across Riot and in Tencent working on, delivering and operating services.
• Serve as technical lead on projects, designing technical solutions and reviewing others’ to anticipate disruptions or complexities. Write critical portions of code and shepherd solutions to successful deployment and operation.
• Plan and sequence the parallel rollout of major system changes using technical designs and instruction.
• Be a standard-bearer and role model of Riot values for your team and others.
• Be a force multiplier for your team. Mentor and direct engineers on your team by breaking down complex tasks and reviewing their delivery.
• Implement and champion engineering standards to ensure high quality code.
• Coach more junior engineers through code reviews and 1-on-1 feedback.
• Troubleshoot live service issues as part of an on-call rotation.
• Seek different perspectives to solve problems, encouraging engineers and others to contribute ideas. Base your decisions on sound analysis and avoid biases.

• 6+ years of experience as a hands-on software engineer working in service development.
• Fluent in written and spoken Mandarin Chinese and English; comfortable communicating technically in both languages.
• Expertise with C#, Java, Golang, or similar language(s).
• Professional experience building large-scale, high-performance backend systems or game services.

Ideal candidates will have broad experience which covers 1 or more of the following:

• Experience working in an agile environment.
• Experience working with C++.
• Professional or hobby experience working with Unreal Engine.
• Professional experience working with cloud computing and cloud technologies.
• Experience delivering complex features in a live game or product.
• Experience working in a distributed environment across time zones and cultures.

For this role, you'll find success through craft expertise, a collaborative spirit, and decision-making that prioritizes the delight of players. We will be looking at your past studies, experience, and your personal relationship with games. If you embody player empathy and care about players' experiences, this could be your role!

At Riot we strongly believe in work / life balance, and we encourage that with our open paid time off policy, paid parental leave (for both primary and secondary carers) and flexible work schedules to fit your lifestyle. We also believe that work should be fun, we have co-op gaming areas, a play fund so you can broaden and deepen your knowledge of players and community, and all the snacks you would ever need to power through your day (even healthy snacks!). And that’s not all we offer, there’s also:

• Medical Insurance that covers you and your dependents
• Employee Assistance Program
• Wellness fund
• Donation matching of time and money to registered charities
• Learning and Development opportunities

At Riot Games, we put players first. That mission drives every decision in our quest to create games and experiences that make it better to be a player. Whether you’re working directly on a new player-facing experience or you’re supporting the company as a whole, everyone at Riot is part of our mission. And just like in our games, we’re better when we work together. Our goal is to create collaborative teams where you are empowered to bring your unique perspective everyday. If that sounds like the kind of place you want to work, we’re looking forward to your application.