Please note: This role is open to UK based candidates only.
Role Overview
A Free to Play Creative Director at Coatsink is responsible for maintaining the vision and quality of our ongoing Free to Play title. You’ll ensure that the game’s content is focused around optimizing (for mobile) live events, features, and monetization strategies to drive player engagement, time spent and revenue growth.
You will work closely with internal and external stakeholders, analysts, UX designers, producers and developers to keep everyone in sync and running efficiently. Most importantly, you will be project vision holder and responsible for selling that vision to our client, using your extensive knowledge and experience on Free to Play gameplay and features to give them confidence in the game’s vision. You must be able to build trust through genuine communication and understanding, while also demonstrating the authority to make and push clear, firm decisions when needed.
As a new specialism here at Coatsink, we are also looking for someone who can instil confidence in us, using data driven reasoning and a friendly and calm attitude to guide the development team, coach and mentor more junior and/or less experienced members of the design team.
Responsibilities & Tasks
* Design and playtest new systems and provide feedback on usability, fun, and balance
* Write and maintain clear documentation tailored to the target user (Code, Design, the Client, etc)
* Iterate on features based on team input, KPIs, and client feedback
* Coordinate FTUE updates with new content or systems so that onboarding stays relevant as the game evolves
* Plan, design, and schedule live ops events, offers, and seasonal content
* Define and communicate the long-term vision of the game’s systems and overall progression
* Ensure new features align with the core pillars and long-term strategy of the project
* Conduct competitive analysis to keep the game relevant in the market.
* Pitch new features or system improvements that support retention, monetization, and player satisfaction
* Act as the “keeper of the vision” for gameplay and meta systems, ensuring consistency across updates
* Work with Clients to ensure Client vision for the game is compatible with the teams vision
* Work with producers to prioritize the roadmap effectively
* Undertake any other reasonable assigned duty, that is line with postholders skills, knowledge and ability
* Manage the backlog of features and improvements, and work with key stakeholders to prioritise them
* Co-ordinate the UX design for several screens of the mobile app, brief external teams on expectations and functionality
* Maintain good knowledge of existing successful mobile games, and regularly conduct competitor analysis to help make and push decisions to both the team and the client
Person Specification
Qualifications
* Relevant university degree or a strong up to date project portfolio (Preferred but not required)
* May have additional postgraduate, management or continuing professional development
Experience
* 5+ years of experience in a Senior design-focused position on a LiveOps project/s for a F2P mobile game
* Extensive experience in a client facing role, being comfortable selling ideas, pushing the vision and instilling confidence is paramount to this role
* Strong understanding of F2P economy design, monetization strategies, and player retention mechanics
* Experience designing and managing LiveOps events, promotions, and engagement loops
* Proficiency in analysing KPIs, interpreting data, and iterating on designs based on performance
* Familiarity with A/B testing, segmentation, and CRM tools to optimize engagement strategies
* Strong collaboration and communication skills to work effectively in a cross-functional team
* Creative problem solver with a player-first mindset and a deep understanding of game design principles
* Experience using Atlassian software (Jira, Confluence etc) is ideal but not essential
* Experience leading a multi-disciplined team on a released title and supporting and coaching less experienced team members
* Significant experience working within a variety of project management methodologies, such as SCRUM
* Experience of developing for mobile, significant experience is essential!
Skills
* Efficient in design solutions, taking into account scope and proposing simple solutions to turn around improvements as soon as possible
* Competent art / graphic design skills to help elevate design documentation and get ideas across
* The ability to lead, impart information, encourage and support junior or less experienced members of the team is vital
* Deep understanding of free to play genre and mobile game design
* Thorough understanding of how to target specific audiences
* Highly developed communication skills
* Competent IT skills
Aptitude
* Highly skilled at adapting quickly to changes and new problems in a calm manner is absolutely essential
* Able to take ownership over decisions and work closely with data analysts to back up these decisions to the client and other key stakeholders
* Highly proficient and effective at working in both small and large teams
* Highly adept at taking and seeking out constructive criticism and using it to improve designs and workflows
* Self-motivated, confident in your own expertise and able to work with independence
* Proactive in your approach to daily workload, actively looking for problems to solve
* Comfortable and confident working very closely with clients and external design teams
* Strong passion for playing video games across a wide variety of genres and advanced analysis of what makes them good/bad
* Willing to embrace, promote and live the Coatsink values