At a Glance
- Tasks: Lead a team to optimise and deliver high-quality games across multiple platforms.
- Company: Join Cast Iron Games, a young studio creating ambitious AAA titles in a supportive environment.
- Benefits: Enjoy a balanced work culture with no crunch, plus opportunities for growth and mentorship.
- Other info: Collaborative atmosphere with a focus on clarity, respect, and technical excellence.
- Why this job: Make a real impact in game development while leading a talented team of programmers.
- Qualifications: Strong C++ experience and leadership skills in game development.
The predicted salary is between 60000 - 80000 £ per year.
At Cast Iron Games, we build technically ambitious games in a calm, focused environment, where every team member has a voice. Based in Tileyard North, we collaborate with high quality partners on high-quality projects, guided by clarity, consistency, and mutual respect. We’re a young and growing studio delivering AAA games. Our experienced team has contributed to some of the industry’s biggest AAA and independent titles, and we’re building a supportive, balanced environment where great work happens without crunch.
We’re now looking for a Lead Programmer to focus on performance, optimisation, and platform delivery, guiding technical problem-solving, supporting team growth, and helping us ship confidently across multiple platforms.
The Role
As Lead Programmer, you’ll guide a small team working within our clients’ proprietary engines. You’ll work across codebases to identify performance issues, resolve low-level technical challenges, and lead the team in shipping games that meet platform standards and run smoothly on real hardware. You’ll collaborate with production, QA, art, and other engineers to profile builds, tackle bottlenecks, and ensure we meet platform compliance requirements. You’ll also provide technical leadership, mentoring others, setting quality standards, and ensuring robust code makes it into builds across all platforms.
Responsibilities
- Lead feature and systems implementation within bespoke or third-party engine codebases
- Collaborate with production and client teams to plan, scope, and track work
- Break down complex tasks into actionable plans for you and your team
- Review team code, offer constructive feedback, and uphold high quality standards
- Mentor junior and mid-level programmers, supporting their growth and autonomy
- Navigate and improve unfamiliar or undocumented code with confidence
- Investigate and resolve engine-level issues, including performance, memory and stability
- Contribute to internal tools, workflows and in-house tech where needed
- Advocate for sustainable, maintainable solutions and clear documentation
What We’re Looking For
Technical Experience
- Strong professional experience with C++ in large, real-time codebases
- Proven ability to work in bespoke or unfamiliar engine environments
- Confident debugging and optimising performance across platforms
- Comfortable working with input, file IO, memory management, threading and build systems
- Comfortable using Perforce or similar source control, and task/bug tracking tools such as Jira
- Experience shipping or contributing significantly to released games
