Senior Systems Designer – Dragonwilds
Jagex
contract
Posted on:
Location Type: Hybrid
Location: Cambridge • 🇬🇧 United Kingdom
Visit company websiteJob Level
Senior
About the role
- Design and own core scalable systems for a large-scale multiplayer, live service experience, including progression, resource management, economy, skills, and more.
- Build interconnected systems that reinforce RuneScape’s identity: freedom of playstyle, mastery, and player-driven choices.
- Prototype, test, and iterate to balance survival challenge with fairness and long-term reward.
- Integrate systems across content, engineering, and art to ensure consistency and immersion.
- Use data, analytics, and player feedback to tune systems and maintain live balance.
- Define and evolve survival mechanics such as crafting, durability, hunger, weather, and resource scarcity.
- Balance risk, reward, and progression pacing to maintain tension and engagement over time.
- Mentor junior designers, providing guidance on systemic thinking and design fundamentals.
- Collaborate with live-ops and production to support updates, expansions, and system evolution.
- Identify and resolve system-level issues or exploits before they impact the live environment.
- Advocate for player experience and RuneScape’s values across the team.
- Contribute to creative innovation while honouring the feel and history of the RuneScape universe.
- Operate autonomously with strong ownership and clear design intent.
- Continually seek new ways to improve systems, pipelines, and team collaboration.
- Deep familiarity with MMO design principles: economy loops, player-driven progression, and emergent play.
Requirements
- Proven experience designing and maintaining systems in a live MMO, multiplayer survival, or similar large-scale game.
- Demonstrable professional games industry experience working autonomously in a system design role, ideally on multiplayer or live-service titles.
- Proven experience designing and balancing interconnected gameplay systems.
- Expertise in progression, economy, and crafting systems, with an analytical and data-informed mindset.
- Strong understanding of MMO design principles, including economy loops, player progression, and emergent gameplay.
- An analytical mindset, combining data insights, player psychology, and design intuition.
- Collaborative, communicative, and comfortable working across multiple teams and disciplines to translate creative direction into functional, scalable systems.
Benefits
- Private Healthcare, including Dental Plan.
- Minimum 6% Pension contributions.
- Employee Assistance Programme & onsite Counselling.
- Life Insurance.
- Discretionary annual performance bonus.
- Enhanced family leave policies from day 1.
- Flexible working hours.
- 25 days annual leave + Bank holidays & the option to buy/sell holidays + so much more!
Applicant Tracking System Keywords
Tip: use these terms in your resume and cover letter to boost ATS matches.
Hard skills
system designgame balancingdata analyticsprogression systemseconomy systemscrafting systemsmultiplayer game designlive service designplayer-driven progressionemergent gameplay
Soft skills
mentoringcollaborationcommunicationsystemic thinkingautonomycreative innovationproblem-solvinganalytical mindsetguidanceteam collaboration