Senior VFX Artist & Animation Generalist

Job Position(s): Senior VFX Artist & Animation Generalist

Zynga is hiring a Senior VFX Artist & Animation Generalist to join their New Games team, with this position open across London, UK and the United States. This role sits inside the art department and is responsible for owning the full VFX and animation pipeline, from early concept through to final implementation inside Unity for mobile casual puzzle games. It suits a hands-on generalist with senior-level credits in real-time VFX production who is equally comfortable building workflows as they are crafting frame-perfect particle effects.

About the Role

The Senior VFX Artist & Animation Generalist works within the New Games art team at Zynga, contributing directly to an original casual puzzle title from early development through to a polished, shippable product. Day-to-day work covers building and maintaining the VFX pipeline, creating celebratory and tactile in-game effects, and collaborating with tech art and engineering on performance profiling for mobile. This is a production-facing role with clear creative ownership, not a support position.

Key Responsibilities

• Own, build, and optimize the VFX pipeline and animation workflow, establishing production standards suited to the visual demands of top-tier casual puzzle games on mobile.
• Create real-time visual effects across the full production arc, from mood boards and concept exploration through to final in-engine delivery inside Unity using Particle System, Shader Graph, and URP.
• Design and implement “juicy” gameplay interactions, including celebratory sequences, UI motion, and environmental effects that reinforce player feedback at every touchpoint.
• Translate rough prototypes, gameplay briefs, and concept direction into polished, performant in-engine assets without requiring hand-holding at each stage.
• Identify technical and workflow bottlenecks across the VFX pipeline and propose solutions in partnership with tech art and engineering on shader development and runtime performance.
• Optimize all VFX and animation output for mobile hardware constraints, balancing visual quality against memory, draw calls, and frame rate targets.

What You Bring

• Senior, Lead, or Principal-level experience creating real-time VFX and animations for mobile games, with credits on casual puzzle or free-to-play titles specifically.
• Proven ownership of a VFX and animation pipeline for mobile, not just contribution to one.
• Deep hands-on Unity experience including Animation Timeline, Particle System, Shader Graph, URP, and custom materials.
• A portfolio that demonstrates full-cycle VFX production, from early ideation to final in-game implementation, with clear evidence of satisfying motion design and visual feedback systems.
• Strong working knowledge of mobile performance optimization, including memory management, batching, and profiling tools.

Why This Role

Zynga sits inside Take-Two Interactive and has shipped titles with over 6 billion downloads across 175 countries, which means the games built here reach a genuinely large audience. The New Games team is at an early stage, so a Senior VFX Artist & Animation Generalist joining now will have real influence over the visual language of the project rather than inheriting locked decisions. The studio has active teams across North America, Europe, and Asia, offering genuine cross-region collaboration on a production with meaningful scale.

Apply now for the Senior VFX Artist & Animation Generalist role at Zynga and bring your VFX pipeline experience to a mobile production built for global reach.