Manager, Animation Art - VALORANT

Animation Leads at Riot support the quality and performance of their team through their craft expertise. Your scope of responsibilities include partnership with team leadership, an understanding of audience resonance, team culture and performance, growth of your direct reports, and leading your team on successful execution of VALORANT’s animation style and quality.

As Manager, Animation Art for Characters on VALORANT, you are responsible for animation on Agents–spanning across 1P, 3P, and Character Select–ensuring their cohesion in style and quality supports VALORANT’s art direction and gameplay. You will partner closely with Art Leads to ensure your team collaborates effectively across disciplines to deliver iconic, creative, and resonant Agents that amplify gameplay for players. You will report into the Character Art Director.

Responsibilities:

• Actively collaborate with team leads to develop a cohesive vision for each Agent that ensures audience resonance, and successful integration with the existing cast through personality, visual aesthetics, and gameplay
• Lead, manage, and mentor a high performing, healthy, and collaborative animation team
• Work with production to ensure your team’s timely and successful delivery of products
• Maintain and contribute to artifacts that inform, align, and empower teams to successfully create character animations in the VALORANT style

Required Qualifications:

• 3+ years of experience leading character focused animation teams in game development
• Strong understanding of animation principles - appeal, timing, spacing, weight, etc.
• Has shipped characters for at least 1 First Person Shooter

Desired Qualifications:

• Experience developing in Unreal
• Knowledge of the VALORANT IP

As a part of the application process, you may be expected to provide a portfolio of your work.

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!

Our Perks:

Riot has a focus on work/life balance, shown by our open paid time off policy, in addition to other perks such as flexible work schedules. We offer medical, dental, and life insurance, parental leave for you, your spouse/domestic partner and children, and a 401k with company match. Check out our benefits pages for more information.

Riot Games fosters a player and workplace experience that values teamwork embodied by the Summoner's Code and Community Code. Our culture embraces differences as a strength, and our values are the guiding principles for how we approach work. We are committed to putting diversity and inclusion (D&I) at the center of everything we do, and promoting a fair and collaborative culture where Rioters treat one another with dignity and respect. We encourage you to read more about our value of thriving together and our ongoing work to build the most inclusive company in Gaming.

It’s our policy to provide equal employment opportunity for all applicants and members of Riot Games, Inc. Riot Games makes reasonable accommodations for handicapped and disabled Rioters and does not unlawfully discriminate on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, age, handicap, veteran status, marital status, criminal history, or any other category protected by applicable federal and state law. We consider for employment all qualified applicants, including those with criminal histories, in a manner consistent with applicable federal, state and local law, including the California Fair Chance Act, the City of Los Angeles Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance, the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance for Employers, the San
Francisco Fair Chance Ordinance, and the Washington Fair Chance Act.

Per the Los Angeles County Fair Chance Ordinance, the following core duties may create a basis for disqualifying candidates with relevant criminal histories:

• Safeguarding confidential and sensitive Company data 

• Communication with others, including Rioters and third parties such as vendors, and/or players, including minors

• Accessing Company assets, secure digital systems, and networks

• Ensuring a safe interactive environment for players and other Rioters

These duties are directly related to essential operations, safety, trust, and compliance obligations within our organization. Please note that job duties may evolve based on business needs and additional responsibilities may be assigned as necessary to maintain operational efficiency and security.