Senior AI Programmer

About Creative Assembly

Creative Assembly is one of Europe's leading games development studios, founded in 1987 and located in West Sussex, UK and in Sofia, Bulgaria. With a heritage of award-winning AAA titles, including the multi-million selling Total War™ series, Creative Assembly continues to build an impressive portfolio of games with an as-yet unannounced FPS-IP and world-renowned partnerships; with Games Workshop on Total War™: WARHAMMER®, Twentieth Century Fox on Alien: Isolation, plus 343 Industries and Microsoft on Halo Wars 2. Creative Assembly has, with their exceptionally talented team of over 700, amassed a wealth of awards including multiple Best Place to Work awards and accolades from BAFTA, Music+Sound and Develop’s Industry Excellence awards.

Position

Creative Assembly are looking for a talented Senior AI Programmer, who is keen to make their mark on the Total War Franchise. This role is based at our Studio in Horsham, West Sussex.

You will be working collaboratively with a diverse group of programmers, designers, and QA technicians to create efficient, and effective, AI solutions to tackle the complex challenges presented Total War’s real-time Battle simulation. This will help deliver a challenging, immerse and fun gameplay experience to our players.

Key Responsibilities

As a Senior AI Programmer, you will be working with colleagues within the AI team, as well as the wider project teams, to help develop code for behavioural elements of the Total War AI systems.

On a day-to day basis, you will:

• Support existing AI systems through incremental improvement, feature updates and debugging along with creating new AI systems in response to project requirements
• Familiarise yourself with the sizeable codebase, and help oversee the architecture of future developments, contributing to a roadmap of future AI systems evolution
• Aid in mentoring more junior members of the team in their technical and professional development and to help set an example of good team working practices

Your qualification

• Excellent C++ programming skills and knowledge of more recent language features
• Previous development experience
• Interest in AI and games
• Strong academic background in a numeric discipline or prior development experience
• Comfortable working in a collaborative, diverse and multi-disciplinary environment
• An ability to focus on working independently when needed
• Creative problem solving

Will be a plus

• Experience developing AI or related systems in games, research, or other settings
• Experience in game development
• Broad gaming experience and a sense for good game design
• An appreciation of games, and Creative Assembly titles, is an advantage

What we offer

Creative Assembly is about the right people making the best games. We are united through our values; Quality, Focus, Teamwork, Respect and Trust.

We house many talented people, from trainees to industry veterans who constantly challenge us and make sure we are striving for the best within our games and our studio life.

Winner of multiple Best Place to Work Awards, we have studio sites in Horsham UK and Sofia Bulgaria, including a number of bespoke state-of-the-art audio suites and a dedicated motion capture site.

Currently we are working fully remotely, and we continue to assess the COVID-19 situation with the safety of our staff our number one priority. We are still actively recruiting and onboarding new staff each week. Our expert IT and HR teams will set you up with everything you need to join remotely whether you will need to relocate to the UK (or within the UK) now, or at a later date.

We offer many benefits to support you and your family including:

• Bespoke relocation package for you and your dependents, with support throughout the process from our dedicated Relocation Specialists
• Enhanced maternity and paternity leave, private medical and dental insurance, life insurance, permanent health insurance, critical illness cover and free health care screening
• Generous holiday allowance plus full studio closure over the Christmas and New Year period, and all UK Bank holidays
• Annual discretionary studio bonus
• Join our award-winning education and social responsibility programme; the Legacy Project, as an industry ambassador to mentor and educate others
• Defined career development pathways and personalised training support including; SEGA Dev Day, internal masterclasses, prestigious creative workshops, on-site training with renowned specialists and global conference attendance
• Opportunity to join our Diversity and Inclusion Network – an employee-led group
• Season ticket travel loans and cycle to work scheme with free bike servicing and discounted car valet service on site
• Free games and merchandise plus access to our extensive games library
• Free breakfast every day - toast, bagels, pancakes, cereals, yoghurts, fresh fruit, smoothies, juices, milkshakes and more in our fully stocked kitchen*
• Wellbeing support with an employee assistance programme and onsite confidential sessions
• In-studio heavily subsidised massage therapy*
• Discounts for home technology, travel insurance, corporate gym membership, cinema tickets, holidays, trips out and Ikea vouchers, and many local businesses including estate agents
• Studio parties for you and your family; such as our Summer Festival, Christmas Party plus a separate Children’s Christmas Party. We also have Cinema days and wrap parties for game releases*
• Studio community activities such as free Japanese lessons, life drawing, creative writing, Pilates, Walking Challenges, Couch to 5k, basketball, game and movie evenings, board game club, 5-a-side football, CA Choir, Sword fighting (yes, sword fighting) and loads more*

*some of the above in-studio benefits are on hold while we work remotely during COVID-19.