Senior Lead Unreal 5 Engineer - UFC-style fighting game

Location : Hybrid / Remote – Montreal, QC Preferred

Employment Type: Full-Time
Reports To : CTO

Role Overview

We are seeking an experienced Senior Unreal5 Engineer to help architect and lead development of a next-generation UFC-style fighting game. You will help define the project’s technical vision, and drive delivery of performant, visually stunning, and highly responsive combat gameplay across console and PC platforms.

This role blends hands-on engineering, requiring deep Unreal expertise, strong architectural instincts, and a passion for combat gameplay fidelity, animation, physics, and multiplayer experiences.

Core Responsibilities

Technical Leadership

• Help Define and maintain the technical architecture for all game systems, tools, and pipelines.

• Help define the engineering roadmap, aligning milestones with production and design goals.

• Partner with Art, Design, and Production leadership to define content pipelines and asset standards.

• Evaluate and integrate cutting-edge UE5 features (Nanite, Lumen, Chaos, Control Rig, Motion Matching).

• Set and enforce performance, stability, and memory budgets for console and PC SKUs.

• Drive adoption of AI-driven animation blending, motion matching, and advanced combat systems.

Hands-On Engineering

• Architect and prototype core systems in C++ and Blueprints.

• Implement deterministic combat loop, rollback networking, and animation blending layers.

• Collaborate with designers and animators to ensure combat feel and responsiveness.

• Integrate and optimize AI/ML runtime inference (ONNX Runtime, PFNNs) for real-time motion.

• Establish CI/CD pipelines, Perforce branch strategy, and automated build systems.

Cross-Team Collaboration

• Work with Art/Animation teams to optimize performance for Nanite/Lumen and animation streaming.

• Partner with Design to translate gameplay concepts into efficient technical systems.

• Collaborate with QA and DevOps for automated testing, performance tracking, and telemetry.

Required Qualifications

• 10+ years professional experience in game development, with 5+ years in Unreal Engine (UE4/UE5).

• Shipped at least one AAA title as a Lead or Technical Director.

• Expert in C++, Unreal Gameplay Framework, and Animation/Physics subsystems.

• Deep understanding of combat systems, animation graphs, and motion pipelines.

• Experience with multiplayer systems, network determinism, and rollback architectures.

• Proficiency with build automation (Jenkins, GitHub Actions) and version control (Perforce).

• Proven ability to recruit, lead, and inspire engineering teams.

• Strong cross-disciplinary communication and production collaboration skills.

Preferred / Bonus Skills

• Experience with AI-driven animation systems (Motion Matching, Neural Networks, PFNN, DeepMimic).

• Familiarity with machine learning inference in real-time environments (ONNX, TensorRT).

• Experience optimizing across PS5 / Xbox Series X / PC platforms.

• Background in fighting, sports, or action gameplay mechanics.

• Experience with Chaos Physics, Control Rig, Motion Warping, and MetaHuman integration.

• Working knowledge of DevOps and CI/CD in Unreal-based pipelines.

• Prior leadership in startup, mid-size, or cross-studio collaboration environments.

Success Indicators (First 6-12 Months)

• Functional core combat loop prototype demonstrating AI-driven blending and animation fidelity.

• Scalable tech architecture supporting multiple fighter archetypes and network play.

• Stable build automation and dev pipeline with profiling, crash reporting, and telemetry in place.

• Delivery of Alpha milestone (Month 12) with performance and determinism targets met.