Senior Level Designer

As a Senior Level Designer at CaptureAge, you will be working as part of an integrated campaign and level design team on ambitious narrative-driven projects in the Age of Empires franchise and beyond.

You will design levels which provide fresh and innovative experiences within the framework of our projects' core gameplay, successfully integrate the narrative vision, guide and orientate players of varying skill levels, and present interesting gameplay challenges. This is a wide-ranging role, presenting an exciting opportunity for an ambitious designer to help shape gameplay and creative vision on our projects.

A strong understanding of both level design and game design is necessary. Existing knowledge of AoE editor tools is not a requirement.

Key responsibilities

• Design innovative levels that balance gameplay mechanics and narrative goals, with a focus on unique and engaging gameplay mechanics

• Create and maintain clear design documentation

• Collaborate closely with writers, game designers, and artists to create immersive, story-driven levels

• Develop level layouts that support both gameplay depth and narrative progression

• Iterate on designs using playtest feedback and design reviews

• Balance levels across multiple difficulty settings

• Work with third-party tools to implement, script, and polish levels

• Provide guidance for junior designers

Qualifications

• Professional experience as a level designer or a similar role in the game industry, preferably in RTS or strategy-based games

• At minimum one shipped game

• Previous experiences with full game production cycles

• Proven understanding of game development tools and methodologies

• Strong written and verbal English skills to effectively communicate ideas and concepts

Skills

• Outstanding level design and game design skills

• Strong understanding of RTS game mechanics, pacing, and player experience

• Proficiency with level design tools and scripting

• Excellent communication and collaboration skills

• Strong attention to detail

Nice to have

• Passion for RTS games and narrative-driven experiences

• Experience with mission design in strategy or tactical games

Application Process

Please answer our form that briefly outlines why you are interested in this role and why your experience and skills make you a good fit. To demonstrate your attention to detail, include the phrase “Baggage Carriers” somewhere when filling the application form.

About CaptureAge

CaptureAge is a company that grew out of the Age of Empires community and is now partnered with Xbox Game Studios to provide game development services in AAA titles like Age of Empires II and Age of Mythology. We have a small (40+) but growing team of passionate game developers, from artists to software engineers.

Inclusivity and Fairness

The people making games should be as diverse as the people playing them and we encourage applications from all backgrounds and identities. As a fully remote and internationally distributed company we are a team that enjoys and celebrates a diversity of voices and perspectives.

Compensation

Our compensation is determined by considering competitive market rates, experience, and cost of living. As a fully international company, we strive to ensure competitive compensation aligned with the local cost of living and market standards.

Fully Remote – Location / Time Zones

We are a fully remote company with team members in 20+ countries across many time zones. We prefer team members who fit within broadly American/African/European time zones (UTC-8 to UTC+3) but we are open to applications from anywhere.

Hours/Time Management

We have a flexible approach to time-management, and we believe in giving team members the opportunity to control their own schedules. We'd like to see a world in which work can fit around your life, not the other way around! In practice this means a few pre-agreed sync points a week, with the rest of your working time entirely up to you – we do not have mandatory core hours.

Async Biased

We lean towards async working arrangements and design our processes and working environment with this in mind.

Consensus Driven

We try to foster a genuinely collaborative and consensus driven approach to our work rather than top-down direction and micro-management.