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Agent guide: [/agents.md](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/agents.md). --- # Lead Game Designer - **Company:** After School Matters, Inc. - **Location:** United States (Remote available) - **Experience:** Expert - **Contract:** Permanent contract - **Skills:** A/B Testing, Data Analysis, Asana, Working Model 2D, Coda, Data Analytics, Interactive Whiteboards - **Published:** August 20, 2026 - **Apply:** https://gamedistrict.applytojob.com/apply/hjT6h9j3Dx/Lead-Game-Designer?source=GS ## About the Role * 5-10+ years in mobile F2P game design, with meaningful time spent leading or mentoring designers. * Shipped multiple live products or major updates, not just prototypes. * Strong systems design fundamentals: gameplay, retention, progression, economy, monetization, LiveOps. * Strong design documentation: specs, economy and progression sheets, and tuning plans that engineers and artists can build without guessing. * A/B testing ownership: hypotheses, test design, analysis, and decision-making. * Comfortable with product analytics and dashboards (e.g., ByteBrew, Adjust) to drive design decisions. * Comfortable leading remotely and influencing without authority. * Very strong English (written and spoken). NICE-TO-HAVES * Hybrid simulation / management (sim/tycoon) game expertise. * Experience building a multidisciplinary design team and specialization tracks from scratch. * Familiarity with predictive modelling and building design analytics pipelines and dashboards. * Familiarity with Unity pipelines and constraints (no coding required). * Experience working with teams across multiple time zones. ## Description We are hiring a Lead Game Designer for a remote position who will own the design vision and quality bar across our games while building and mentoring a multidisciplinary game design team that consistently delivers high-quality, data-informed experiences. This is a product-focused leadership role responsible for improving retention, engagement, progression, and monetization by defining a clear design direction, maintaining a high standard of design quality, and driving a disciplined A/B testing and design R&D practice. The role is fully remote and requires at least 4-5 hours of daily overlap with Pakistan Standard Time (GMT+5). This role is ideal for someone who: * sets a clear design vision and holds a high quality bar without becoming a bottleneck * is hands-on with systems design and design documentation, not only management * builds and mentors designers toward domain specialization * uses data and experimentation to prioritize and validate design decisions, 1) Design Vision & Direction * Own the design vision for all products, setting the design foundation and guiding designers at a high level. * Align with Studio Head and Game Leads on where each game's design is headed. * Co-own the design direction of each product with Game Leads; escalate major design pivots to the Studio Head. * Turn ambiguity into clear design direction and build-ready decisions. 2) Design Quality Bar (Hands-on) * Set and maintain standards for all design documentation, sheets, A/B tests, and playtesting protocols. * Review specs, economy and progression sheets, and feature docs for completeness, clarity, and applied data analytics. * Lead the design of major systems where needed: core loop, progression, economy, monetization, and LiveOps. * Establish and maintain a clear design quality bar across the studio. 3) Design Team Development & Specialization * Hire, onboard, and mentor game designers to be multidisciplinary and eventually specialize across three domains: * Gameplay, Retention & Engagement * Economy, Progression & Data * Monetization & LiveOps * Run weekly 1:1s with all direct reports. * Build successor capability: at least one designer ready to lead design on a product. * Reduce the number of design decisions that escalate to Game Leads and the Studio Head. 4) A/B Testing Ownership * Own the studio-wide A/B testing pipeline and set best practices for hypotheses, test documentation, analysis, and decision-making. * Co-own A/B test and feature-shipping prioritization with Game Leads. * Convert test insights into backlog priorities and measurable design actions. 5) Design R&D & Analytics * Lead R&D in game design tools and best practices, data analysis pipelines and dashboards, and predictive modelling. * Stay current on every product's analytics and dashboards. * Learn and apply data analytics and predictive modelling to at least one product. 6) Playtesting & Design Fluency * Involve the whole studio in frequent playtesting sessions (our products and beyond). * Maintain a personal playtime practice of roughly 3 hours per product weekly, and feed notes into designer 1:1s. * Attend design reviews as a participant and quality challenger, not the sole decision-maker. 7) Stakeholder Communication & Clarity * Keep leadership updated with clear status, risks, and next steps. * Write concise decision notes that reduce confusion and rework. * Ensure the team has clarity on what success looks like for each design initiative. KEY DELIVERABLES (EXPECTED OUTPUTS) * A clear, documented design vision and direction for each product. * A maintained design quality bar: standards and templates for specs, sheets, A/B tests, and playtesting. * A multidisciplinary design team with visible progress on each designer's specialization track. * A running studio-wide A/B testing pipeline with quality hypotheses, documentation, and analysis. * Design R&D output applied to live products (tools, dashboards, predictive models). * Regular design reviews with clear decisions, action items, and ownership. DECISION RIGHTS & INTERFACES * Design hires, exits, and specialization paths. * Studio-wide design quality standards and review metrics. * A/B testing methodology and pipeline. * Design tooling and R&D investment. You co-own (with Game Leads) * Design direction of each product. * A/B test and feature-shipping prioritization. * Major design scope decisions affecting team capacity. You co-own (with the Studio Head) * Studio-level design strategy and big design decisions. * Budget for design tools, R&D, and design-team headcount. You influence / support * Retention, monetization, and player-experience improvements via design changes, experiments, and insight-driven recommendations. Individual designers retain authority on * Specific feature design decisions within the agreed direction. * Day-to-day design execution and documentation on their assigned product. Escalate to the Studio Head * Anything affecting studio-level commitments (GP, ROI, capacity). * Major design pivots on a product. * Cross-studio or group-level design topics., * Coda (documentation hub) * Miro (flows, maps, UX collaboration) * Asana (tasks + planning) * Slack (daily communication) * ByteBrew / Adjust (analytics & dashboards) WORKING MODEL * Remote * High-ownership role. We care about outcomes, not meetings. * Must be available for key overlap hours with GMT+5 for reviews and alignment ## Related Videos - [Beyond the 9–5: Designing Work Around Humans](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/1321-beyond-the-9-5-designing-work-around-humans) - [A Founder's Journey : From Startup Chaos to Purposeful Growth](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/1926-a-founder-s-journey-from-startup-chaos-to-purposeful-growth) - [Bringing the power of AI to your application.](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/1010-bringing-the-power-of-ai-to-your-application) - [How Data is Shaping our Games](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/176-how-data-is-shaping-our-games) - [Building the platform for providing ML predictions based on real-time player activity](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/944-building-the-platform-for-providing-ml-predictions-based-on-real-time-player-activity) - [Beyond Autocomplete: Local AI Code Completion Demystified](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/videos/961-beyond-autocomplete-local-ai-code-completion-demystified) ## Related Articles - [How We Built a Worry-Free System That Runs for 10+ Years – And What We’d Do Again](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/751-how-we-built-a-worry-free-system-that-runs-for-10-years-and-what-we-d-do-again) - [What Developers Can Learn from Indie Games](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/650-what-developers-can-learn-from-indie-games) - [WWC24 Talk - Brenda Romero - Stay: Surviving and Thriving in Tech](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/467-wwc24-talk-brenda-romero-stay-surviving-and-thriving-in-tech) - [Dev Digest 120 - Apple and peers](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/455-dev-digest-120-apple-and-peers) - [Dev Digest 129 - Now that's what I call private data!](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/468-dev-digest-129-now-that-s-what-i-call-private-data) - [Dev Digest 130 - The Diablo is in the details](https://www.wearedevelopers.com/magazine/470-dev-digest-130-the-diablo-is-in-the-details)