A culture of quality: Friday the 13th dev IllFonic is hiring

Author: by Shannon Gerritzen, director of communications for IllFonic

Presented by IllFonic

IllFonic, the studio that developed the no. 3 game on Playstation Store for 2017 Friday the 13th: The Game (F13), is ramping up production on several unannounced projects.

According to leaders at the studio, this led to the opening of a new studio location in Tacoma, WA in November 2018, in addition to their headquarters in Golden, CO.

"Having offices in the greater Seattle and Denver metropolitan areas is really helping us attract some legends in the game industry, and a bunch of fresh talent to the team," says CEO Charles Brungardt. Currently there are 16 positions open on their website www.illfonic.com. 

IllFonic was founded 12 years ago, this November, by computer scientist and musician Charles "Chuck" Brungardt. From the beginning, IllFonic set out to leverage advances in technology to create games that rival "AAA" quality at a third of the price and development time. Cutting their teeth working on games such as Dead Alliance, Star Citizen, Evolve, Armored Warfare, Crysis 3, and Nexuiz, it was only a matter of time before they were given the task of leading development for a title like F13. 

Friday the 13th: The Game

CEO Charles Brungardt says, "After F13, a lot of proposals were landing in our laps, and we had to be really selective in what to pursue -- we needed to grow while at the same time maintaining the open studio culture that made us who we are today."

IllFonic has picked its projects and planned its growth in a manner that is calculated for the long term future, meaning they want to hire and retain talent and not expand and downsize with projects. Just about everyone who was there from the beginning is still there -- which says a lot about the company.

If IllFonic has learned anything over the last decade, it's that great games come from a great team, and they have to preserve their open studio culture.

"It is, probably by far, the most exciting time in the history of the company," says IllFonic president and technology startup veteran Anthony Fassero. "We have been very careful to preserve our company identity as an independent studio as we have grown, and have a great working culture across multiple locations.

He added, "People coming to work at IllFonic from smaller studios are learning quickly from the experts, and those from larger studios are finally getting to work with smaller teams and shorter development cycles. There is something to be said for giving people the trust to make decisions and support needed to make it a reality. It also helps that the team are huge fans of the projects that we are working on."

IllFonic has managed to grow while keeping a company culture that is fun and creative. The idea that everyone has something to offer helps lend to the culture. When you take a look at each person's history at IllFonic you can see there is a wealth of knowledge to pull from. On average across the entire company, IllFonic employees have approximately seven years in the industry and have worked on nine titles each. Be sure to keep an eye on IllFonic and its upcoming titles. 

To learn more about IllFonic and the positions currently open visit: http://bit.ly/illfonicjobs

Written By: Shannon Gerritzen

Shannon is the director of communications for IllFonic. She has worked on multiple titles in both publishing and development, as well as in the hardware and esports sides of the industry. Shannon has been in the industry for seven years. She has a love for the art of video games and is known to play a little Street Fighter at home and in the office.