About Our Studio and Role

We are Darkbright Studios, creators of Smolbound! We are a dynamic, growing startup led by a decorated team of industry veterans, and backed by some of the biggest names in the gaming space. We’re dedicated to showing the world that web3 isn’t a genre - it’s a platform that best-in-class, unforgettable experiences can be built on!

We are seeking a Backend Engineer to join the team and help us craft extensible experiences that will delight and engage players for years to come. You'll be a crucial part of our team, helping design, build, and maintain backend systems that support millions of players worldwide. Day to day will involve shaping and optimizing backend architectures, ensuring they’re scalable, cost-effective, and adaptable across a variety of platforms and technologies. If you’re looking for ownership, chances for big impact, and forging the building blocks to enable something great, then you might be who we’re looking for!

Here at Darkbright, we operate on open-minded ownership as inspired builders of passion. That’s all fancy words to just say–we put product, quality, and fun first. We are scrappy, nimble, and happy to move with some ambiguity. We each bring strong discipline and passion each day, and most of all, we love games. If working in a tight-knit, collaborative team within a high impact role sounds like what you want, we'd love to chat!

Who You Are

• You are a self-starter who takes initiative to tackle complex problems and enjoys finding creative solutions
• You are comfortable taking ownership, with an ability to drive projects forward with minimal oversight, and a history of delivering impactful results
• You enjoy working in a team, valuing collaboration and clarity when communicating with cross-functional teammates
• You thrive in dynamic, fast-paced environments
• You enjoy leveraging your expertise while continually learning new technologies and approaches to stay ahead
• You love video games, and building the blocks to make things work!

Responsibilities

Backend Architecture Design & Development:

- Design, implement, and support backend systems using technologies such as **ASP.NET Core**, **EF Core**, and **MySQL**, ensuring scalability and flexibility.
- Provide systems that can scale to handle **10K–1M+ DAU** with predictable costs and minimal downtime.

Live-Ops Game Features & Data Management:

- Build and maintain APIs for leaderboards, live events, telemetry, player account management, and game state persistence.
- Develop dynamic configuration systems to enable real-time updates for live-ops features without downtime (including delta-updates).

Cloud-Native Operations:

- Implement cloud-agnostic systems to ensure vendor flexibility and cost efficiency.
- Utilize cloud platforms (e.g., GCP, Azure, or AWS) for efficient hosting and scaling of backend services.

Database Management & Reporting:

- Design and optimize schemas for relational databases, with a focus on **MySQL** or other relational systems.
- Write and maintain **SQL-based business analytics reports**.

Collaboration & Documentation:

- Work closely with **game/client-side developers** to understand gameplay requirements and ensure seamless backend integration.
- Create and maintain comprehensive documentation.

CI/CD Pipelines & Automation:

- Build and maintain **CI/CD pipelines** to support backend deployment, testing, and scaling.

Monitoring & Security:

- Monitor system health and performance using logs, metrics, and analytics tools.
- Implement robust security measures, including encryption, role-based access control, and compliance with industry standards.

Continuous Improvement & Innovation:

- Advocate for best practices in backend development, testing, and deployment.

Bonus Points!

• Proficiency in ASP.NET Core, EF Core, and relational databases like MySQL.
• Strong experience working with (Unity/C#) game developers integrating with backend services.
• Experience setting up and/or integrating with multiplayer backend services
• Strong experience with cloud-agnostic solutions and multi-cloud strategies.
• Experience designing backend systems for live-ops games and multiplayer scalability.
• Proficiency in writing complex SQL queries and generating business analytics reports.
• Familiarity with caching (e.g., Redis), messaging systems (e.g., RabbitMQ), and asynchronous workflows.
• Knowledge / experience of Web3/blockchain integrations, such as:
  • Smart contracts, blockchain wallets, and on-chain/off-chain interactions.
  • Integration with blockchain platforms for on-chain game economies.

Application Requirements

To apply, please send us the following materials:

• Your resume
• (Optional) A cover letter

If you choose to include a cover letter, what you put is up to you - but we’d love to learn more about you and why the world of Smolbound speaks to you. The most important part is to be genuine and have fun with it - we want to know you, not just what you’ve done!

This studio provides equal employment opportunities to all employees and applicants for employment and prohibits discrimination and harassment of any type without regard to race, color, religion, age, sex, national origin, disability status, genetics, protected veteran status, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, or any other characteristic protected by federal, state or local laws. This policy applies to all terms and conditions of employment, including recruiting, hiring, placement, promotion, termination, layoff, recall, transfer, leaves of absence, compensation, and training.