// JOB DESCRIPTION

The Last Sage is an original VR-first dark fantasy RPG that combines party-based tactical combat, environmental storytelling, and psychological themes into a deeply immersive experience.

We're looking for a VFX Artist who wants to help shape how magic looks and feels in this world. A world shaped by history, sacrifice, and forgotten truths. In combat your effects are also information: with no conventional HUD, they help tell the player who is under stress, who is hurt, and when an enemy can be stopped.

About the Project

**Title:** The Last Sage

**Genre:** VR-first Dark Fantasy JRPG

**Engine:** Unreal Engine 5.7

**Platforms:** Steam PCVR and Flatscreen

**Current Stage:** Showcase demo in active development

Core gameplay systems are already functional, including combat, party systems, stress mechanics, AI foundations, and exploration. The project's next milestone is a playable showcase demo that supports future funding efforts.

Why This Role Matters

The combat systems for The Last Sage are built and playable, and most of what they show today is stock effects. What we need now is someone who can turn the game's visual direction into effects a player can read in a headset, in the middle of a fight.

Each of the three party members has an approved effect style: one precise and geometric, one heavy and organic, one built from steel and air. Severed enemy parts, interrupted attacks, and a character close to breaking all depend on your work to land. If an effect can't be read, the player loses information they need to play.

The Opportunity

This is an opportunity to define how magic and combat look in an original universe. Most effect hooks are already built and resolve through a data-table registry, so you can focus on the look. In most cases you author the asset and fill its row, with no Blueprint work.

As VFX Artist, you'll work directly with the project's founder and Art Director to bring the approved styles to production quality.

What You'll Own

You'll own the effects the player sees across the demo, including:

Party ability and projectile effects

Each hero's signature effect style

Stress, Overload, and injury body reads

Enemy hit, death, and charge effects

Weak-point, sever, and dismantle effects

Mote and shard effects

Environment effects for the demo level

The measured cost of every effect you author

You'll also influence combat readability, the project's VFX standards, and how effects pair with sound and animation.

What Success Looks Like

By the conclusion of this engagement, the demo's new effects will be in the game and running inside budget. Success is measured by how clearly a player can read a full fight in a headset rather than by how an effect looks in a capture.

Expected deliverables include:

Body-read set for stress, Overload, and injury

Dismantle effects: sever burst, severed chunks, interrupt fizzle, and hand telegraph

Enemy death and mote effects

Boss creature effects

Signature effect sets for all three heroes

World effects for the demo level's key moments

Editable Niagara sources, materials, and source textures with every delivery

Production Context

This engagement focuses on real-time effect production in Niagara and materials. Engineering and hook work are handled by the founder.

You'll initially collaborate with:

Founder / Creative Director / Principal Developer

Art Director

Sound Designer (being hired now)

Animator (being hired now)

Project status

Core gameplay systems are functional.

The demo level is built and has had its look pass.

Every effect the demo needs is listed, with a written brief for what it must show the player.

VFX standards and a naming convention are already in place.

Designing for VR

This project is built for VR first. This changes how effects are experienced. Players stand beside your effects rather than watching them on a screen. A sprite that looks right on a monitor can show up as a flat card at arm's length, screen-space tricks break in stereo, and anything near the player's hands has to be built from meshes. Effects never fade or flash the screen or move the camera. The project holds a 90 fps floor on PCVR, so an effect's measured cost is part of whether it is accepted.

Experience with VR development is valuable, though candidates with transferable experience building real-time effects under tight frame budgets are also encouraged to apply.

Who You Are

We're less interested in job titles than in experience solving the kinds of creative problems this project presents.

Ideal candidates may include:

Senior VFX Artists

Real-Time VFX Artists

Technical Artists with an effects focus

VFX Leads

Experienced Indie VFX Artists

We're especially interested in people who have worked on:

Niagara

Effects performance and optimization

Magic and combat effects

Material-driven effects

Dark fantasy

Narrative-driven games

VR projects

Unreal Engine productions

The Ideal VFX Artist for The Last Sage

You enjoy:

Making effects that carry gameplay information

Giving each character a look of their own

Saving spectacle for the moments that earn it

Working inside a hard performance budget

Collaborating closely with animators and sound designers

Balancing artistic ambition with production realities

Engagement

This is a fractional, milestone-based contract engagement focused on the project's showcase demo. Demo content locks on February 1, 2027, so your availability before then matters.

Compensation combines paid milestone work with the opportunity to participate in the project's longer-term success through revenue sharing on accepted demo work, consistent with the project's collaboration model.

Learn More

If this opportunity resonates with you, we'd love to start a conversation. We'll share additional material with interested candidates, including a worldbuilding overview, the deliverables for this role, and the demo roadmap.

VFX Artist