Jackbox Games Looking for Front-End Engineer (1-3 YoE) at Chicago, IL Full Time

Jackbox Games is a small game studio (:80 people) best known for our Jackbox Party Pack franchise: a set of five social party games released every fall. Since 2014, our games–like Quiplash, Drawful, and Trivia Murder Party– have been featured on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, by Polygon, and in living rooms and finished basements across the world.

In 2020, we had over 200 million users. And we have hard evidence that one of those users was Academy Award-winner Charlize Theron.

You can learn everything you ever wanted to know about how our games work (spoiler: your phone is the controller!) and who we are and what we make at jackboxgames.com.

What is the job?

At Jackbox Games, we create unique, social games that bring people together. We’re looking for an Entry-Level Front-End Software Engineer who enjoys solving problems, contributing to impactful projects, and growing their abilities through collaboration and feedback. If you’re looking to grow by working on real-world challenges, learning how to turn ideas into solutions, and contributing to team success, we want to talk to you.

🚨 This is not a game development role. 🚨

What You’ll Do

• Support the development of engineering projects by contributing to well-defined tasks and collaborating with more senior engineers to solve problems
• Help build and maintain scalable, high-performance frontend components in Vue.js, with guidance to ensure reliability, maintainability, and test coverage
• Learn to estimate tasks with support from your team and deliver solutions within project timelines, while keeping collaborators informed of your progress
• Work closely with designers, artists, and engineers to bring player experiences to life and support improvements to development workflows
• Contribute clear and helpful technical documentation to support team knowledge sharing and consistency
• Grow your engineering skills through code reviews, mentorship, and continuous learning, while contributing to team discussions on improving processes and practices

What We’re Looking For

• Some experience with software development, whether through internships, coursework, personal projects, or early professional experience (1-3 years)
• Interest in learning Vue.js (or experience with similar languages or frameworks)
• A willingness to tackle new challenges and grow your problem-solving skills with support from your team
• Basic understanding of how scalable systems work, with an eagerness to deepen your knowledge
• Good communication skills and a collaborative mindset; you’re comfortable asking questions, sharing ideas, and learning from others
• Exposure to or interest in cloud platforms and containerization technologies like Docker or Kubernetes

OKAY, BUT WHAT ARE THE PERKS?!

• Pay range: $79,799 – $103,727. Please note: individual compensation packages are based on factors unique to each candidate and position, including (but not limited to) skill set, experience, and qualifications
• 401(k) with matching and various medical plans. We pay 100% of the cost of premiums for dental, vision, disability, and life insurance for our employees. We also cover a really nice chunk of the cost of premiums for spouse/partner/dependent medical, dental, and vision insurance.
• Flexible work schedule and environment. Currently, our employees are encouraged to work where they feel the safest and most productive. Our office in Lincoln Park in Chicago is open for folks who prefer to work in the office. We also offer remote work in the following states: California, Florida, Illinois, Indiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Vermont, Washington, and Wisconsin
• Flexible PTO. Take time off when you need to recharge, take a trip, or just catch up on life
• Annual stipends for therapy, growth, wellness, and home office equipment to encourage our employees’ lifelong learning pursuits and support mental and physical health
• Creative work environment. We are lucky to work in a place that is full of talented and innovative folks. Most of the day, the place is pretty quiet (we’re a focused bunch), but this is punctuated with hilarious outbursts and general merriment
• Free food either virtually or in the office. We stock our kitchen with snacks as well as offer doordash credits quite frequently

Interested?

Great, we look forward to reading your application. Please include:

• Your resume
• A cover letter. You don’t need to be a professional writer for this job (we have those) but communication is important so we weigh cover letters heavily.

On the fence? If you’re interested in the job but worried you aren’t qualified, we encourage you to err on the side of applying. We’d hate to miss out on great candidates just because they’re worried they don’t check every box on the job description.

We know it is a time commitment to prepare an application and we respect that effort by thoughtfully reviewing every complete application and responding one way or the other. But that kind of thoughtful review means that it sometimes takes us a while to get back to applicants, so please be patient with us and no phone calls.

Thanks for your interest in Jackbox Games!