This Lead Digital Experience Engineer role puts you at the helm of the digital experience for a global gaming phenomenon, based in Auckland, NZ. Forge the future of a global gaming phenomenon.
Competitive salary + flexibility for exceptional talent.
Location: Auckland, NZ (Hybrid preferred) | Remote considered for legendary talent
⚔️ Do you live and breathe games? (Lead Digital Experience Engineer)
We’re looking for someone who doesn’t just build software — they build experiences. The kind players remember. The kind that feels effortless. The kind that quietly makes someone stop and think… “That was beautifully designed.”
If you’re someone who:
🎲 Attends Tournaments
You know the thrill of the competitive scene. You understand what players need from a digital platform, because you’ve stood on both sides of the table. You’ve queued for finals, tracked standings, and lived for the moment your deck or army performed exactly as you envisioned.
Big Wave Digital works with studios across Australia and New Zealand to place Lead Digital Experience Engineer talent, and candidates in this space often review resources like the Nielsen Norman Group’s guide to UX for context on where the craft is heading. You can also browse more Lead Digital Experience Engineer and gaming industry roles on our job openings page.
🎨 Paints Miniatures
You obsess over detail. You know that a millimetre of highlighting changes everything. That same eye for craft belongs in great software. You understand that what looks simple on the surface took countless iterations of patience and precision to perfect.
🌐 Builds Fantasy Websites
You’ve created digital worlds for fun. Lore wikis, campaign trackers, fan sites — you understand what makes a fantasy community come alive online. You’ve wrangled custom themes, built interactive tools, and crafted experiences that players return to again and again.
🐉 Runs D&D Campaigns
You’re a worldbuilder and a storyteller. You manage complexity, create memorable moments, and bring people together around shared imagination. You understand that the best experiences — digital or physical — emerge from deep empathy with your players.
…then this quest might be for you.
🏰 This isn’t your typical Frontend Engineer role
It’s something much rarer. A unique opportunity combining frontend engineering, product thinking and creative execution. You’ll own and shape how our digital experiences look, feel and behave across products used by players all over the world.
You’ll help define:
- ⚔️ Product experiences
- ⚔️ Website experiences
- ⚔️ Internal tools
- ⚔️ User journeys
- ⚔️ Frontend architecture
- ⚔️ UX direction
- ⚔️ Technical decisions
- ⚔️ The future of our digital ecosystem
This isn’t about implementing tickets. It’s about creating experiences.
🌍 The world you’ll help build
We’re an independent game studio behind one of the world’s fastest-growing fantasy trading card games. Our players span more than 50 countries. Thousands of game stores. Millions of player interactions.
Unlike many gaming companies, we believe games should bring people together — around a table, inside local game stores, at national championships, at world events. Our digital platforms exist to support that incredible community, not replace it.
🎨 Engineering meets creativity
We’re looking for someone who moves comfortably between engineering and design. You’ll work across:
- ✨ Product experiences (GEM, Card Vault and future products)
- ✨ Website and campaign experiences
- ✨ Internal tools and operational systems
- ✨ UX improvements
- ✨ Frontend architecture
- ✨ Continuous improvement
🧙 We think you’ll thrive here if you…
- ✔ Care about craftsmanship
- ✔ Have exceptional visual taste
- ✔ Sweat the small details
- ✔ Think about users before frameworks
- ✔ Love solving messy problems
- ✔ Enjoy ownership
- ✔ Challenge ideas respectfully
- ✔ Like making complicated things feel beautifully simple
- ✔ Want to leave every product better than you found it
⚡ Your toolkit probably includes…
- 5–10 years building modern digital products or web applications
- React, Vue or similar frontend frameworks
- HTML5, CSS3 and modern JavaScript
- REST and/or GraphQL APIs
- Reusable component design
- Responsive UI
- CI/CD, Git
- Modern frontend architecture
- Product collaboration & UX thinking
Bonus XP if you’ve worked with:
- 🐲 WordPress
- 🐲 Design systems
- 🐲 Motion or interaction design
- 🐲 Figma
- 🐲 Accessibility
- 🐲 Performance optimisation
- 🐲 SEO
- 🐲 Gaming, fantasy or fan communities
🛡 Why you’ll love it here
- ✨ You’ll own the frontend experience across multiple products
- ✨ You’ll influence product, UX and technical direction
- ✨ You’ll have genuine autonomy without layers of bureaucracy
- ✨ You’ll work with passionate creatives, engineers and product thinkers
- ✨ You’ll build products used by a global community
- ✨ You’ll see the impact of your work every day
🎲 You might be one of us if…
- You build side projects because you can’t help yourself
- You appreciate beautifully designed software
- You own too many board games
- You love fantasy worlds
- You enjoy crafting elegant interfaces
- You’ve spent far too long tweaking tiny UI details that nobody else noticed
- You believe software should create emotion, not just functionality
🏆 Final Boss — How to Apply
Don’t just send us your CV. Show us something you’re genuinely proud of:
- ⚔️ A frontend or UX decision you’re proud of
- ⚔️ A product or experience you helped build
- ⚔️ A production issue you solved and what you learned
We’re far more interested in how you think than how many frameworks you’ve memorised.
🐉 Ready to build something legendary?
If you’re looking for the opportunity to shape products, influence creative direction, own technical decisions and build experiences that thousands of passionate players interact with every day — we’d love to hear your story.
Seniority Level: Mid-Senior level | Employment Type: Full-time | Location: Australia and New Zealand (Remote)
🔥 The World We’re Building
Like the greatest fantasy worlds — from the Forgotten Realms to the planes of Dominaria — what we create must be epic in scale, breathtaking in execution, and unforgettable to those who experience it.
We’re not building software. We’re building the digital heartbeat of a global gaming phenomenon — the platform that millions of players around the world trust for the games they love.
Are you ready to forge something legendary?
