Senior Technical Combat Designer

At Side, we partner with some of the world's leading developers and publishers to solve complex production challenges and help bring exceptional games to life. From concept through live operations, our co-development teams work as trusted extensions of our clients' studios, contributing expertise across design, engineering, art, audio, QA, and production.

We're looking for a hands-on Senior Technical Combat Designer to help create and refine engaging boss encounters, enemies, and combat systems in Unreal Engine. This role is ideal for someone who understands combat not just from a design perspective, but from an animation and implementation standpoint, and who can take a combat character or encounter from concept through in-engine execution and iteration.

This is a remote freelance contract for approximately 3–6 months, with up to 40 hours per week of support needed. Candidates must be available to overlap with the CEST team's working hours; location is otherwise flexible.

As these are project-based opportunities, positions may be amended, postponed, or withdrawn as a result of changing client requirements and project priorities.

What you'll be doing:

Combat & Encounter Design

• Build and balance bosses and enemies in Unreal Engine, with ownership of at least two combat characters or equivalent systems.
• Design attacks end to end, including animation hookup, hitbox timing, cancel windows, hit reactions, i-frames, and telegraphs.
• Increase combat variety and improve the overall combat experience through hands-on iteration and balancing.

Animation & Combat Feel

• Apply strong animation principles around weight, timing, anticipation, and readability to create responsive, impactful combat.
• Author or modify animations in Maya, MotionBuilder, Blender, or similar tools and integrate them into gameplay.
• Diagnose combat and animation issues using concepts such as frame data, startup/active/recovery, hitstop, input buffering, and cancel windows.

Unreal Implementation

• Implement combat using Unreal Blueprints, Behavior Trees, Animation Blueprints, state machines, blend spaces, montages, and animation notifies.
• Use Niagara to prototype combat effects and visual feedback.
• Collaborate with engineering, animation, VFX, and design teams to troubleshoot and iterate on gameplay.

What we're looking for:

• 5+ years of experience designing and implementing combat for video games, including ownership of 2+ combat characters or equivalent systems.
• Strong understanding of animation principles and combat feel, with the ability to identify why an attack doesn't land, read, or feel as intended.
• Hands-on Unreal Engine experience with Blueprints, Behavior Trees, Animation Blueprints, and related animation systems.
• Experience with third-person combat, fighting games, shooters, or other combat-focused titles.
• Ability to author or modify animation using Maya, MotionBuilder, Blender, or similar tools.
• Working knowledge of combat frame data, hitstop, input buffering, cancel windows, hit reactions, and i-frames.
• Basic C++ knowledge and comfort using AI-assisted coding tools to support gameplay implementation.
• Ability to work independently, take ownership of craft, and drive problems to solutions.

Nice to have:

• Experience creating and balancing complex boss encounters.
• Experience with Niagara and gameplay VFX prototyping.
• Experience working in a co-development or external development environment.