PlayFirst is an innovative entertainment company that makes games appealing to everyone. We create engaging story worlds that capture imaginations and we make those experiences available everywhere consumers want to play. PlayFirst teams create outstanding games, then we bring those games to life across popular platforms worldwide including PC, Mac, mobile, handheld, and console. The company’s portfolio includes world-renowned titles, such as Diner Dash®, Wedding Dash™, Chocolatier™, and Dream Chronicles™. PlayFirst games are available in major retailers and on more than 500 sites in 20 languages.
Founded in 2004 by veterans of Internet portals, traditional games publishers, entertainment software, and technology firms, PlayFirst is funded by Mayfield Fund, Trinity Ventures, Rustic Canyon Partners and DCM. PlayFirst, Inc is headquartered in downtown San Francisco.
JOB DESCRIPTION:
Our ideal candidate will have solid experience developing consumer facing web applications using Java frameworks and Web 2.0 technologies. You will be a core member of a focused team of experts in J2EE middleware and game development technologies. You will have broad responsibilities that affect the future direction of www.playfirst.com.
RESPONSIBILITIES:
• Work directly with a cross-functional team of engineers, producers, graphic designers, and QA to design and innovate cutting-edge features for casual games and e-commerce.
• Design and implement features from concept to completion, driving UI design and usability while addressing performance and scalability challenges.
• Be responsible for the full life-cycle of projects, including requirements design, technical design, task estimation, implementation, automated testing, debugging, and deployment.
REQUIREMENTS
• Bachelor’s degree (or higher) in Computer Science.
• Enthusiasm about casual games and computer gaming
• 4 or more years’ experience developing Java software applications.
• Experience designing and building database intensive applications.
• Successful previous experience delivering consumer facing scalable web applications
• Strong background in modern J2EE development, including JSP/JSTL, MVC frameworks (e.g., Struts, Spring, Tapestry), ORM technologies (e.g., Hibernate), SQL, automated unit testing
• Familiarity with industry standard open source Java technologies such as Ant, JUnit, Lucene, Velocity, etc.
• Familiarity with web browser technologies, especially DHTML, JavaScript, AJAX, and CSS
• Passion for community-driven Web 2.0 user experiences.
• Comfortable with software development on Linux/BSD
• Experience developing applications in a startup environment emphasizing collaborative design and individual responsibility.
• Excellent written and verbal communications skills.
• Eligibility to work in the U.S. without sponsorship
PREFERRED
• Comfortable writing presentation-quality front-end HTML, DHTML, Javascript, and AJAX.
• Experience with Struts.
• Experience with Hibernate.
• Experience with Postgresql.
• Experience with scripting languages (at least one of perl, python, ruby, php, or lua) and an understanding of their application to web development.
• Experience developing and deploying networked multiplayer games..
BENEFITS:
Core benefits include: health, dental, vision, life/disability, flexible spending accounts, 401(k) and stock options. PlayFirst is located in the heart of the financial district / SOMA (2 blocks from BART) and offers great fringe benefits, including generous paid time off, 10 company holidays, yoga, chair massage, snacks, refreshments, and company-wide "playdates" to test each of our games during the development process.
Salary to be determined by education and experience.
Interested? To apply for this position, please email your resume in a standard Word or PDF document to jobs@playfirst.com and include "senior J2EE web developer" in the subject line.