Riot Games Game Developer Interview Questions
& Process

The interview process involved an HR screen, then a design interview with a team member. After that, there was a second design interview with a different team member. Following those, I interviewed with one of the two design department heads, and then with the other department head. The whole thing took a few weeks. They did offer me the job, but then rescinded it when I tried to negotiate salary.

I applied online as part of their general call for intern applications. I answered the initial questions and then wrote a few pages about resource gating theory, which was unsolicited but I figured it would help me stand out. After that, there were game-specific questionnaires that had right and wrong answers, but they really focused on explaining your thought process. Then came a phone interview, which was easy to schedule and pretty informal, typical for Riot. The interviewer was relaxed, and I felt like my thoughts were valued even if I didn't get the job. When I got invited for the on-site, Riot was great about scheduling. I asked about dates to see the LCS super week, and they not only accommodated my travel dates but also got me tickets after they sold out. The intern interviews were set up so that a group of interns interviewed each day, but only one person for each specific role, so we weren't alone but not directly competing. Project leads came to us in a room, so I didn't have to move around much. They seemed genuinely interested in helping me make a good impression, and the questions felt like real challenges to my creative thinking. Mr. Cadwell's interview was the hardest, with questions on machine learning that seemed outside my background. I was invited back for a second day because they thought I'd be a good fit for other teams. This day was a bit more hectic with the regular intern interviews happening, but it was still a positive experience. I got to talk with other teams, and again, felt like my input mattered. Riot has a single recruiter for interns throughout the process, which made communication easy.

A buddy put my application in for the R&D team. It took about two weeks to hear from a recruiter, and we had a short, kinda weird 10-minute chat about the design test. The design test itself was supposed to take 5 hours, which it did. They got back to me a week later. The first interview was supposedly a "behavioral interview" with two lead designers, but it was really more of a design chat, no behavioral stuff. The second interview was called a "design craft interview" with a designer and the design director. It was basically the same as the first interview, which was a bit of a bummer. They didn't even talk about my design test. They only asked about making new content/expansions for existing games (that Riot didn't make). The interviews were about a week apart. They told me they weren't moving forward with my candidacy but offered an optional "feedback" interview to explain why and where I could improve my design skills. I took it and gave them some feedback on the interview process too, which they seemed to consider. It was surprising how receptive they were, especially with everything going on at Riot right now. I'm definitely open to working there in the future because of how the R&D leads handle feedback.