Staff Machine Learning Engineer, Animation - Singapore Efficiency Team

About the Position

Riot Games, established in 2006 by passionate gamers, is seeking a Staff Machine Learning Engineer, Animation for its Singapore Efficiency Team. As the creators of League of Legends, the most played PC game in the world, we are dedicated to evolving and improving the gaming experience for our players. We are looking for ambitious professionals who are passionate about games and have a knack for seeing things differently.

In this role, you will be instrumental in building technology that enhances the animation process, allowing our creative teams to focus more on performance and expression. You will report to the Sr Manager, Machine Learning Engineer.

Responsibilities

• Build assistive animation tools using motion synthesis, motion matching/blending, retargeting, and physics-based character control to streamline the animator's workflow.
• Collaborate with animators and tech artists to target and reduce costly keyframing, cleanup, and retargeting tasks.
• Define and run evaluations for motion quality (naturalness, foot-sliding, responsiveness) and quantify the time saved for animators.
• Stay updated with developments in motion generation and character control, ensuring they align with production rigs and runtime budgets.

Requirements

• Education: Master’s or Ph.D. degree in Computer Science, Statistics, Mathematics, or a related field, with a focus on Machine Learning, Data Science, or Artificial Intelligence.
• Animation Specialization: Deep, proven expertise in motion and character-animation ML, covering motion synthesis, motion matching, retargeting, physics-based control, and reinforcement learning for character control.
• Experience: At least 5 years of experience applying Machine Learning to real-world problems, with a demonstrated record of delivering impactful, end-to-end ML solutions in Animation in a fast-paced environment.
• Evidence of Expertise: Demonstrated through peer-reviewed publications (e.g. SIGGRAPH, SIGGRAPH Asia, NeurIPS, ICLR, CVPR) and/or shipped projects, open-source contributions, or production systems in Animation that pushed the technical frontier.
• Technical Skills: Proficiency in programming languages such as Python, C, C++, or C#, and strong hands-on experience with frameworks such as PyTorch, TensorFlow, or JAX.
• Analytical Skills: Strong understanding of statistical analysis, experimental design, and evaluation techniques.
• Generative Models: Deep, hands-on experience with Generative Models, including motion diffusion and flow matching models, VAEs, and autoregressive/transformer motion models, applied to building artist-assistive tools and accelerating technical steps in the animation pipeline.
• Communication Skills: Excellent communication skills, with the ability to effectively communicate complex technical concepts to non-technical stakeholders.
• Leadership: Leadership experience, including mentoring junior team members and interns and driving cross-functional collaboration, is highly desirable.

Desired Qualifications

• Experience working in the gaming industry or a related field is a plus.

We Offer

• Full relocation support
• Full health insurance for you, your spouse, and children
• Open paid time off
• Retirement benefits with company matching
• Life insurance, parental leave, plus short-term and long-term disability
• Play Fund to broaden and deepen your knowledge of our players and community through games
• We will double down on your donations of time and money to non-profits

About the Company

Riot Games was established in 2006 by entrepreneurial gamers who believe that player-focused game development can result in great games. In 2009, Riot released its debut title League of Legends to critical and player acclaim. As the most played PC game in the world, over 100 million players enjoy League of Legends every month. Players form the foundation of our community, and it’s for them that we continue to evolve and improve the League of Legends experience.