Job description

Help us create bold, immersive audio in a gritty sci-fi universe. Stunning visas, foreboding surrounds, realistic machinery, an ecosystem teeming with creatures – we need you to bring it to life.

In this role you will:

• Design ambient and sound effect assets
• Work with the team to implement dynamic audio systems
• Polish and refine created audio to studio standards
• Understand the game design and desired player experience
• Design sounds with an emphasis on authenticity and how it would sound and function in real life

Job requirements

• 4+ years professional audio experience, ideally in sound design
• An understanding of game audio pipelines
• Pro user of Cubase and/or ProTools
• Experience with FMOD (or a similar audio engine)
• An understanding of game audio implementation
• Excellent communication and time management skills
• Any experience in Unreal engine will be a real plus 

Sharing a link to a portfolio of sounds you have created, ideally in action inside a game or interactive experience, is highly recommended. 

The position is full time, permanent and onsite in Auckland. Assistance is provided for relocation & support for obtaining a visa. We highly value diversity. Regardless of disability, gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity, or any other aspects of your culture or identity you have an important role to play in our team.

Job description

We’re looking for someone to craft the aural experience of our game. If you’re up for the challenge of crafting the complete audio experience of a cozy, accessible game for consoles, PC, tablet and mobile, we want to hear from you!

What we’re looking for:

• Concept, placeholder and temp-tracking of sound and music to establish the game’s audio style.
• Sourcing and/or recording of foley for all of the game’s in-game and UI sound effects. The game covers both realistic and fantasy elements.
• Coordinating with and/or supervising the musical direction of the game.
• Help with the direction and integration of full character voice over for all in-game dialogue.
• Planning and scheduling of the entire audio production from concept to shipping.

Regardless of whether you produce your work alone, alongside a composer, or with outsourcing, we would be interested in hearing from you if you think you can deliver on the above.

Our dream candidate:

• Loves every aspect of audio design, and has a passion for sharing great design found in games and other media.
• Has a deep understanding of “cozy” games, builders or life simulation games.
• Understands and appreciates the considerations and opportunities afforded by designing for console, PC, tablet and mobile devices.
• A kind and supportive team member – someone who doesn’t hesitate to give others feedback on their work in a way that makes them feel valued, and is excited to present their ideas when others have problems.

This is a remote-working position:

• Work around your family and personal commitments. Work any hours of the day and week that make sense for you. We generally communicate over Slack or email, with occasional voice/video chat when convenient.
• You will need to have some reasonable timezone overlap with both Melbourne and the US. Sorry, European applicants!
• We’ll be trusting you to be self-motivated and able to manage your own time and workload; we won’t be micromanaging your task list.

This will be a full time fixed-contract position for 12-18 months, covering the duration of the project.

About Studio Drydock
Studio Drydock is making games for diverse audiences, and it’s super-important to us that our team is just as unique and varied. We encourage you to apply even if you don’t think you meet all of the criteria. You won’t find any guns or explosions in Studio Drydock games; we’re making experiences for the vast majority of the world that finds fun in creativity, exploration and building. Studio Drydock is built on a foundation of support and independence in equal measure. We value our team members’ unique experiences and trust them to do their jobs the way they know how, knowing people will reach out when they need it.

Responsibilities

• Follow and assist in the creative and technical execution of the audio vision set out by the Product Manager / Game Designer
• Help set out the direction for the audio assets needed in the game
• Design high quality audio assets – Create, record, edit audio for Background Music, Sound effects and Voice over.
• Test all aspects of the audio to ensure playback is as intended and fit for commercial release
• Participate in planning and milestone delivery for the assets
• Participate in establishing and maintaining the overall audio quality for the game
• Optimize the sound assets to meet the performance and memory requirements of the game engine for HTML5 games

Requirements:

• 2+ years industry experience in mobile, social, or free2play games.
• Respond well to artistic direction but can deliver with minimal supervision.
• Manage responsibilities across multiple projects.
• Implement audio using in-house tools or industry standard audio middleware
• Ability to match the sounds assets to the overall themes and art direction
• Style and technique versatility, can work on a range of games with different themes with focus on casual over hardcore games.
• Verbal and written communication skills in English

Bonus points:

• Shipped multiple mobile games

Work Responsibilites

• Creating sound for player, enemies, user interfaces, and other in-game elements
• Implementing sound effects in-game, primarily with Wwise
• Finding appropriate sounds from our internal sound library or foley recordings, processing them for use in-game, and implementing them with Wwise or other middleware
• Communicating with other staff to provide ideas and feedback on how to improve our sound design

The Ideal Candidate has…

• A passion for game sound
• The drive to work with other staff to make enjoyable games, using their own unique abilities
• The desire to improve overall game quality by using their own skills and cooperating with other staff
• An interest in researching and using new sound technology and equipment to improve the production pipeline

Necessary Skills and Experience

The ability to create quality sound effects using a DAW (Nuendo, etc) and digital audio editors

Lead Sound Designer positions also require:
Experience using Wwise to implement sound, doing sound direction, or managing sound outsourcing schedules

Desired Skills

Substantial experience with foley and/or field recordings

Conditions

No games industry experience is required, but applicants must be able to contribute to game development as a sound designer.