{"id":13198,"url":"https://alion.io/job/devotedstudios-backend-engineer","title":"Backend Engineer","company":{"id":4138,"name":"Devoted Studios","domain":"devotedstudios.com","url":"https://alion.io/company/devotedstudios","size_band":"201-500","is_staffing_agency":false,"employer_type":"direct","is_intermediary":false,"listed_via":null,"ats_vendor":"Workable","truth_index":{"grade":"B","score":83,"open_postings":4,"ghost_share":0,"stale_share":0.5,"repost_share":0,"time_to_fill_p50_days":70,"computed_at":"2026-10-17T05:46:00Z"}},"role":"Backend","role_family":"Backend","seniority":"senior","employment_type":null,"work_mode":"remote","remote_scope":"stated_countries","remote_scope_basis":"board_field","remote_working_hours":null,"hiring_geo_confidence":"structured","locations":["Montreal, Canada"],"countries":["CA"],"hiring_countries":["CA"],"hiring_countries_total":1,"salary":null,"salary_estimate":{"min_usd":67000,"max_usd":137000,"period":"year","method":"role_country_seniority_unknown","sample_n":589},"experience_years_min":5,"visa_sponsorship":false,"relocation_package":false,"has_equity":false,"technologies":[{"name":"Amazon CloudWatch","optional":false},{"name":"Amazon EC2","optional":false},{"name":"Amazon ECS","optional":false},{"name":"Amazon EKS","optional":false},{"name":"Amazon S3","optional":false},{"name":"Apache Kafka","optional":false},{"name":"API Gateway","optional":false},{"name":"AWS","optional":false},{"name":"AWS Lambda","optional":false},{"name":"C++","optional":false},{"name":"CI/CD","optional":false},{"name":"CloudFormation","optional":false},{"name":"DynamoDB","optional":false},{"name":"IAM","optional":false},{"name":"Java","optional":false},{"name":"Kubernetes","optional":false},{"name":"Least Privilege","optional":false},{"name":"Model Context Protocol","optional":false},{"name":"Obsidian","optional":false},{"name":"OWASP","optional":false},{"name":"Redis","optional":false},{"name":"Rest API","optional":false},{"name":"Scala","optional":false},{"name":"Terraform","optional":false}],"status":"live","first_seen_at":"2026-07-09T00:00:00Z","employer_posted_date":"2026-07-09","last_verified_at":"2026-10-17T13:55:38Z","board_verified":true,"closed_at":null,"days_open":100,"trust":{"level":"ok","repost_count":0,"flags":[],"days_open":100},"description":"Devoted Studios is a globally remote game development company specializing in Co-development, Porting, and End-to-End Art Production for the global gaming industry.\nOur team includes world-class talents who bring deep expertise in external development, pipeline optimization, and creative problem-solving. Whether it’s porting games to new systems, enhancing gameplay features, or crafting stunning visuals, Devoted Studios operates as a trusted, flexible extension of our partners’ internal teams.\nWe are proud to be the development partner of choice for industry leaders such as:\nEpic\nXbox\nMeta\nObsidian Entertainment\nRiot\nGearbox Software\nWe are looking for a Backend Engineer with strong Java and C++ experience to work on backend systems supporting game functionality and the client/server interface.\nThis role sits at the intersection of backend services and game client integration, requiring someone who understands not only how to build reliable server-side systems, but also how those systems are consumed by game clients. You will work across the MCP backend, client/server interface, and JSON export processes, with a strong focus on performance, efficiency, security, and correctness.\nThe ideal candidate is comfortable working within real-world performance constraints and understands how techniques such as throttling, batching, caching, and mocking API calls can reduce unnecessary database writes, minimize latency, and keep systems responsive at scale.\nBecause these systems handle sensitive player data, we are looking for an engineer with sound technical judgment, disciplined testing practices, and exceptional attention to detail.\nKey Responsibilities:\nService Design & Architecture\nDesign and build scalable, resilient web services in Java and/or Scala that support game client needs across PC, console, and mobile\nOwn the data model - choose the right store (MongoDB for flexible document storage, DynamoDB for key-value at scale, Redis for caching and session state) and justify it\nDesign REST APIs that game clients actually integrate well against - clear contracts, versioned, documented, forgiving of client-side variation\nArchitect for the load profile of a live game: average load, launch spikes, event peaks, and graceful degradation when upstream dependencies fail\nDefine and enforce service boundaries - knows where one service ends and another begins, and why\nAWS Infrastructure & Deployment\nBuild and maintain AWS infrastructure using IaC tooling (CDK, Terraform, or CloudFormation - confirm what's in use on the engagement)\nOwn the deployment pipeline for services they build: CI/CD configuration, environment promotion, rollback capability\nRight-size AWS resources for cost and performance - does not default to over-provisioning and does not leave obvious cost inefficiencies\nFamiliar with the AWS services relevant to game backends: EC2, ECS/EKS, Lambda (where appropriate), API Gateway, ElastiCache, SQS/SNS, CloudWatch, S3\nUnderstands the network and security posture of services exposed to game clients - VPC design, security groups, IAM least privilege, secrets management\nLive Operation & Observability\nInstruments every service for production readiness: structured logging, metrics, distributed tracing, health checks, and alerting before it goes live - not after the first incident\nMonitors services in production: reads dashboards, interprets anomalies, distinguishes noise from signal\nResponds to production incidents in services they own - has on-call responsibilities commensurate with service criticality\nWrites post-mortems and follows through on structural improvements so the same failure mode does not recur\nUnderstands the difference between a symptom and a root cause - does not fix symptoms\nCross-Platform Client Integration\nWorks directly with game client engineers (PC, console, mobile) to define integration contracts, review client-side usage patterns, and debug integration issues\nUnderstands the constraints of each platform environment: console certification requirements around network usage, mobile data sensitivity, PC permissiveness - and designs service interfaces accordingly\nOwns the integration surface: API documentation that is correct, versioned, and kept up to date as the service evolves\nParticipates in client-facing technical reviews where backend service design is on the table\nQuality & Engineering Standards\nWrites unit and integration tests as a first-class output - not an afterthought\nCode reviews: gives specific, actionable feedback and receives it without defensiveness\nMaintains service documentation: architecture decisions, operational runbooks, known limitations, dependency map\nRaises technical debt explicitly - names it, quantifies its cost, and proposes a remediation path\nRequirements\n5+ years of professional software engineering experience, with significant experience developing backend/server-side systems.\nAt least 2 years of professional Java experience, including production backend development.\nAt least 2 years of professional C++ experience, ideally in game development or another performance-sensitive environment.\nDemonstrated experience working across the client/server interface, rather than purely backend development.\nExperience developing and integrating REST APIs and working with JSON-based data exchange.\nExperience with JSON export/data serialization processes.\nStrong understanding of performance optimization techniques including throttling, batching, caching, request optimization, and API mocking.\nExperience designing systems that minimize unnecessary database operations and network calls.\nPreferred\nExperience designing services that handle launch-day spikes: horizontal scaling patterns, queue-based load levelling, circuit breakers\nFamiliarity with platform-specific SDK constraints: PlayStation Network, Xbox Live, Nintendo NSO, or Apple/Google mobile - understanding what the platform restricts and what it requires from the backend\nKafka or SQS/SNS for event-driven service communication\nKubernetes (EKS) cluster operations experience\nSecurity-conscious engineering: OAuth/OIDC, rate limiting, input validation, OWASP awareness at service design level\nBenefits\nThis is a full-time employment role with standard benefits in Quebec Province","description_format":"text","description_chars":6269,"description_truncated":false,"requirements":{"experience_years_min":5,"management_years_min":null,"team_size_min":null,"manages_managers":false,"education":null,"security_clearance":false,"languages":[]},"benefits":[],"hiring_locations":[{"name":"Canada","iso":"CA","kind":"country"}],"hiring_excludes":[],"relocation_offered":false,"industries":["Game Development"],"lifecycle":[{"event":"open","at":"2026-07-09T00:00:00Z"}],"visa":[],"liveness":{"score":36,"band":"fade","label":"Fading","p_open":1,"p_active":0.815,"p_room":0.44,"age_days":100,"expected_fill_days":70,"reasons":["conf:1","win:tail","crowd:"],"computed_at":"2026-10-17T05:46:00Z"},"pay":null,"html_url":"https://alion.io/job/devotedstudios-backend-engineer","json_url":"https://alion.io/job/devotedstudios-backend-engineer.json","meta":{"generated_at":"2026-10-17T16:01:40Z","cache_seconds":300,"methodology":"https://alion.io/methodology","terms":"https://alion.io/terms","contact":"https://alion.io/contact","api":"https://alion.io/developers","about":"Alion is a live layer of people, companies and AI agents: who they are, whether they are real and active right now, what they do and how to work with them, readable by people and by agents and paid per call.","catalog":"https://alion.io/catalog.json","usage":{"tier":"crawler_verified","counted_by":"address","units_charged":1,"used_today":21822,"day_limit":null,"remaining_today":null,"minute_limit":300,"resets_at":"2026-10-18T00:00:00Z"}},"offers":[{"id":"company.slices","title":"One company in depth, by slice","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002,"plus_per_slice":{"credits":0.05,"usd":0.005}},"unit":"per company, plus each slice with data","note":"the employer in depth","call":{"mcp_tool":"get_company","arguments":{"id":4138},"rest":"https://alion.io/mcp/rest/get_company?id=4138"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.slices&for=job%2Fdevotedstudios-backend-engineer"},{"id":"market.stats","title":"A market slice: pay, demand and time to fill","status":"live","price":{"credits":1,"usd":0.1},"unit":"per slice","note":"pay, demand and time to fill for this role and place","call":{"mcp_tool":"market_stats"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=market.stats&for=job%2Fdevotedstudios-backend-engineer"},{"id":"job.search","title":"Open jobs by role, technology, place, pay and visa","status":"live","price":{"credits":0.02,"usd":0.002},"unit":"per posting in a list","note":"similar open postings","call":{"mcp_tool":"search_jobs"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=job.search&for=job%2Fdevotedstudios-backend-engineer"},{"id":"company.verify","title":"Is this company real and active right now","status":"pilot","price":null,"unit":"per company","request":{"url":"https://alion.io/catalog/request","method":"POST","body":"{\"offer\": \"company.verify\", \"for\": \"job/devotedstudios-backend-engineer\", \"note\": \"what you need it for\"}"},"human":"https://alion.io/catalog?offer=company.verify&for=job%2Fdevotedstudios-backend-engineer"}]}