Lead 3D Designer (Remote)

Position Summary

A5 design team is seeking an experienced and visionary Lead 3D Designer to head our 3D art team in the creation of high-quality, stylized assets and scenes for real-time applications in iGaming. We innovate and combine popular game mechanics into a new catergory of casino games with a special twist of strategy, when players need to think and influence the game result. This role combines hands-on expertise in modeling, texturing, and Unity implementation with team leadership, workflow ownership, and visual direction influence.

As a creative leader, you will mentor and guide a team of 3D artists, establish production pipelines, ensure technical consistency, and collaborate closely with other disciplines to deliver beautiful, performant content optimized for mobile and low-spec platforms.

Key Responsibilities

Leadership & Supervision

• Lead, mentor, and manage a team of 3D artists (3-5) across asset production, Unity integration, and visual delivery.
• Review work for quality, adherence to style, and technical accuracy - providing constructive feedback and coaching.
• Drive daily/weekly task planning and align 3D output with project timelines.
• Contribute to defining and upholding the project's visual identity alongside the Art Director.
  
  
  

3D Art Production

• Create and oversee the creation of stylized 3D assets (props, environments, and characters) with clean topology, optimized UVs, and high-quality PBR textures.
• Utilize Blender, Maya, ZBrush, Substance Painter/Designer, and Photoshop to deliver modular, reusable, and performant assets.
• Maintain and evolve asset libraries, LOD systems, and atlasing strategies for scalable content development.
  
  
  

Unity Integration & Scene AssemblyAssembly

• Supervise and contribute to the setup of prefabs, materials, lighting hooks, and scene assembly in Unity.
• Ensure scene organization (naming, hierarchy, scaling) is clean and efficient across projects.
• Support developers in integrating 3D content seamlessly into gameplay, UI, and interaction logic.
  
  
  

Pipeline & Workflow Optimization

• Define, document, and enforce 3D production workflows to improve efficiency and cross-discipline collaboration.
• Proactively identify and implement tools, scripts, or plug-ins to streamline asset creation and integration.
• Work closely with technical artists and engineers on asset validation, compression settings, and build-readiness.
  
  
  

Cross-Team Collaboration

• Partner with animators, VFX artists, game designers, and engineers to align visual output with user experience and gameplay goals.
• Ensure 3D assets support runtime performance targets, mobile budgets, and game design intent.
• Participate in design reviews, sprint planning, retrospectives, and art critiques.
  
  
  

Requirements

Must-Have

• 5+ years of experience in 3D modeling and texturing for games or interactive applications.
• 2+ years in a leadership or senior mentorship role on a creative team.
• Expert proficiency with 3D tools (Blender, Maya, Substance Suite, Photoshop) and Unity 3D.
• In-depth understanding of real-time rendering, optimization for mobile platforms, and asset performance trade-offs.
• Experience guiding teams in prefab creation, asset organization,
  
  
  

Nice-to-Have

• Experience collaborating on or directing animation pipelines, including rigging, skinning, blend trees, and Timeline-based systems.
• Working knowledge of Unity Shader Graph, VFX Graph, and lighting pipelines.
• Familiarity with Addressables, asset bundling, and runtime asset management.
• Background in casual, stylized, or casino mobile game production.
• Scripting knowledge (Python, C#, or similar) for tool development and pipeline automation.
• Understanding of VFX integration workflows and mobile-friendly effects setup.
  
  
  

What we offer:

• Hardware Allowance: $2,000 upfront to set up your ideal workspace, plus \$1,000 annually thereafter.
• Paid Time Off: Our unlimited leave policy supports flexibility and well-being. Team members typically take 22–30 days off per year.
• Learning & Development: $2,000/year to support your professional growth - we cover 50% of eligible learning expenses.
• Remote Work & Flexible Hours. Relocation to Japan as an option / Business trips to Japan might be required.