Staff software engineer – data

Engineers at Riot master their craft by building, launching, and operating games that delight players all over the world. As a Staff Software Engineer you will embody engineering excellence to your immediate collaborators and to the whole game dev team. You’ll lead from the front through your individual contributions and support others through mentorship and participation in the wider tech community.

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 will build player facing game features powered by machine learning models, and the backend services that collect and process data at global scale. You will collaborate with engineers, data scientists, producers, and game designers in using data to create player impact. You’ll influence the technical direction for how data services are built, scale and are operated. You will report directly to the VALORANT Data Lead.

Responsibilities:

• Hold the technical vision for how data is used to improve VALORANT
• Lead development of game features that integrate machine learning into the game server, backend services, and data warehouse
• Support data scientists and analysts with tools and automation that make their workflows more efficient and repeatable
• Ensure that data systems meet game team standards for reliability and maintainability
• Create and improve engineering best practices, development processes, and coding standards on VALORANT
• Mentor other data developers on the team

Required Qualifications:

• 6+ years of experience as a software engineer
• Experience building software across multiple languages (e.g., Golang, Python, or C++)
• Experience leading the development and operation of large-scale machine learning systems, including gathering requirements, designing production-ready architecture, and sustainably supporting high availability services
• Experience with data processing (e.g., Spark, BigQuery, DataProc), storage (e.g., S3, Google Cloud Storage), transport (e.g., Kafka, PubSub), and orchestration (e.g., Airflow, Luigi)
• Experience deploying cloud infrastructure (e.g., AWS, GCP) using containers and orchestration (e.g., Docker, Kubernetes), managed using infrastructure as code (e.g., Terraform, Ansible)
• Experience coaching those around them across all roles, and mentoring mid and senior level engineers

Desired Qualifications:

• Experience working with data scientists and analysts
• Interest in working with Unreal Engine
• Familiarity working in an Agile environment

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 the experiences of players, this could be the role for you!

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.

(Los Angeles Only) Base salary range between $178,500 USD – $249,900 USD + incentive compensation + equity + 401K with company match + medical, dental, vision, and life insurance + short and long-term disability + open PTO.

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, including the City of Los Angeles’ Fair Chance Initiative for Hiring Ordinance relating to an applicant’s criminal history (LAMC 189.00).

Tagged as: Airflow, Ansible, Automation, Aws, Bigquery, Cloud Infrastructure, Data Processing, Data Systems, Docker, Google Cloud, Infrastructure, Kubernetes, Machine Learning, Maintainability, Mentorship, Python, Reliability, S3, Terraform, Unreal Engine, Workflows