Streaming giant Netflix is seemingly delving deeper into the realm of artificial intelligence with a new job listing for a Technical Director, AI/ML – Games for its R&D team that’s tasked with leading the company’s investments in building new games that weren’t previously possible without current AI/ML technologies.
Netflix says that it wants to delve into novel applications of emerging technologies, uncovering innovative game designs and architectures that were previously beyond reach. Adding that its dedicated team will nurture and prototype these concepts, with the ultimate aim of establishing a full-fledged team to develop solutions that have the potential to revolutionise the gaming industry.
The company aims to amp up its gaming efforts by also leveraging AI and ML. The ideal candidate for the Technical Director role should be able to, “Find opportunities to integrate ML/AI technologies with not entirely known game development systems and processes is key, and being able to do enough hands-on prototyping work in the early days to demonstrate inspiring traction is needed,” Netflix writes.
Netflix’s gaming ambitions
Netflix says that although, “Pre-existing deep knowledge of AI/ML is not required, some awareness and interest in diving in and building a workable knowledge in collaboration with an AI/ML expert partner is expected.”
The ideal candidate is also expected to have up to, “10+ years experience shipping AAA, casual or mobile games, with high complexity innovations (vs solely iterative or pure sequels), in a technical director type role” as well as “Familiarity with multiple game engine technologies such as Unity3D and UnrealEngine.”
While its gaming ambitions haven’t exactly been as successful as its streaming endeavour, Netflix proved it is serious about its gaming plans after revealing that it plans to roll out more video games based on its IP, with 55 games currently in development.
However, despite the company’s foray into gaming, previous data has shown that the majority of subscribers have yet to try out any of the Netflix game offerings. But this might soon change seeing how Netflix is bringing popular titles such as Football Manager 2024 and up to 70 other games that users can play.
Isa Muhammad is a writer and video game journalist covering many aspects of entertainment media including the film industry. He's steadily writing his way to the sharp end of journalism and enjoys staying informed. If he's not reading, playing video games or catching up on his favourite TV series, then he's probably writing about them.