Principal Software Engineer, Client - Wild Rift
Riot GamesResponsibilities
- Define the client technical strategy, architecture, multi-year roadmap, engineering standards, and architectural guardrails.
- Own non-functional quality targets including frame time, memory, startup time, crash rate, thermal behavior, and device-tier quality.
- Lead the architecture of Unity client systems and frameworks covering gameplay systems, UI, content/runtime boundaries, asset management, and rendering/performance foundations.
- Set rendering and graphics direction, including quality tiers, visual budgets, shader and asset constraints, and scaling tools for flagship and low-spec devices.
- Lead complex client problems hands-on from technical investigation and design through rollout and post-launch validation.
- Establish profiling, observability, and automated quality and performance gates.
- Maintain the Unity engine optimization pipeline and diagnose engine-level performance overhead.
- Raise engineering quality through RFCs, design reviews, code reviews, technical standards, and mentorship.
- Partner with gameplay, tech art, design, QA, release, platform, and co-development teams to align execution.
Requirements
- A BS in computer science, computer engineering, or a related field, or equivalent experience.
- At least 4 years as a tech lead or principal engineer setting technical direction for a mobile game client.
- At least 8 years of deep experience building and shipping large-scale Unity-based mobile game clients for iOS and Android, or equivalent experience extending and operating a commercial game engine at the runtime, rendering, or client architecture layer.
- Strong modern C# experience and a record of architecting large, live client codebases.
- Demonstrated measurable quality and performance improvements on constrained, low-spec hardware across a broad device matrix.
- Hands-on experience profiling and optimizing CPU, GPU, and memory behavior with industry-standard tooling.
- Experience leading technical design reviews, establishing engineering standards, and driving strategy across teams.
- Co-development experience is desired.
- Experience with a globally scaled MOBA or other real-time competitive game is desired.
- Experience extending Unity engine systems, asset/build pipelines, or client performance tooling is desired.
- Shader authoring and PBR pipeline experience, or close collaboration with technical art, is desired.
- Experience supporting emerging markets and fragmented Android hardware is desired.
- Familiarity with applying machine learning to rendering or asset pipelines is desired.
Tech Stack
Categories
About Riot Games
Since 2006, Riot Games has stayed committed to changing the way video games are developed, published, and supported for players. From our first title, League of Legends, to 2020’s VALORANT; we have strived to evolve the community with growth in Esports, and expansion from games into entertainment. Players are the foundation of Riot's community and because of them, we’re able to reach new heights. Founded by Brandon Beck and Marc Merrill, Riot is headquartered in Los Angeles, California, and has 4,500+ Rioters in 20+ offices worldwide. Riot has been featured on numerous lists including Fortune’s “100 Best Companies to Work For,” “25 Best Companies to Work in Technology,” “100 Best Workplaces for Millennials,” and “50 Best Workplaces for Flexibility.” Riot Games recruiters will never ask for money or request sensitive information, and they'll always reach out from an @riotgames.com email address. You can learn more about Riot’s interview process here: https://www.riotgames.com/en/work-with-us/interviewing-at-riot/interview-process