The mission of The New York Times is to seek the truth and help people understand the world. That means independent journalism is at the heart of all we do as a company. It’s why we have a world-renowned newsroom that sends journalists to report on the ground from nearly 160 countries. It’s why we focus deeply on how our readers will experience our journalism, from print to audio to a world-class digital and app destination. And it’s why our business strategy centers on making journalism so good that it’s worth paying for.
Mission Overview & Responsibilities:
The New York Times is looking for a Game Designer for our portfolio of games. At NYT Games, we aim to be the premier destination for digital puzzle games. We are proud to publish human-made puzzles every day, including beloved games like Wordle, Spelling Bee, Connections, and the New York Times Crossword. Our games are played by tens of millions each week.
This is an individual contributor role. You will collaborate with multiple disciplines to identify and improve critical aspects of our game experiences, create new puzzle games, delight audiences, and further our creative and business goals. We value an environment of learning and collaboration. You'll cultivate your craft skills with the support of fellow designers, attend regular design rituals where you'll receive and provide critiques, and identify opportunities for consistency across the function. NYT Games is not a traditional gaming company. While prior games/puzzles industry experience is required, you are someone who can embody essential NYT values like trust, curiosity, and empathy, and recognize that ensuring the mission of independent journalism is core to everything we do.
This is a hybrid position based in our New York City headquarters.
Responsibilities:
Design and document systems and requirements for new games, and features and metagame systems for existing games.
Articulate and communicate a vision for game design goals, keeping your team aligned with that vision.
Design holistically and with the broader NYT Games aesthetic and style in mind.
Use several visualization tools to express design concepts, engagement systems, retention mechanics.
Support high-level games strategy, hone game ideas into concrete approaches, collaboratively lead the narrowing down of ideas and establish clear requirements.
Collaborate with UX/UI designers, Engineers and Producers to prototype, improve, test and launch betas for new games, ensuring design quality and consistency.
Partner with the research team to shape games grounded in user insights.
Contribute to team and product design rituals.
Demonstrate support and understanding of our value of journalistic independence and a strong commitment to our mission to seek the truth and help people understand the world.
You will report to the Executive Director of Product Design.
Basic Qualifications:
3+ years of experience as a Game Designer for commercial digital games.
A portfolio of work that showcases your process along with finished game design work.
2+ years of experience presenting ideas, aligning cross-functional teams and stakeholders around a clear, motivating vision, and on shared priorities.
2+ years experience with user research and synthesis.
Proficiency in communicating game design philosophy for developing games and features.
Proficiency in prototyping and collaboration tools (ex: Figma, Play, Cursor, Gemini Canvas, Retool, Miro).
Preferred Qualifications:
Experience working both independently and collaboratively on projects that are known to pivot quickly.
Demonstrate design decisions and impact.
Understanding of the digital games market.
Experience designing competitive frameworks, and ability to administer a competition.
Enthusiasm for word and puzzle games.
#LI-Hybrid
REQ-019090
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