Remote Server Engineer (PHP) for High-Scale Mobile Casino Game

At Amber, we seek the industry's most talented individuals. We are dedicated to delivering top-notch service to our customers, recognizing that our employees are key to success. We offer attractive compensation packages and ample opportunities for growth. Our team values continuous improvement and innovation, working together towards common goals.

About the Role: Backend/Server Engineer

We are seeking an experienced Backend/Server Engineer to join our team working on one of the top mobile social casino games, which serves hundreds of thousands of daily players. This is a full-time remote contract position (40 hours/week, core hours 9am–5pm US Central Time) with no fixed end date.

You will primarily focus on PHP-based server-side development, ensuring scalability, reliability, and feature richness. You will also have the opportunity to contribute to the game’s Unity-based client (C#) and its admin tools.

If you thrive on solving complex backend problems and want to see your work impact a massive audience, this adventure is for you.

Key Responsibilities: The Quest

• Develop and maintain backend features: Design, implement, and optimize server-side functionalities (primarily in PHP) for the mobile game’s backend to support new game content and events.
• Ensure server reliability and performance: Quickly debug and fix server issues or performance bottlenecks to ensure a smooth experience for a large player base.
• Contribute to client-side when needed: While backend is your main realm, you will contribute to C# (Unity) code to implement client-side aspects of features when necessary.
• Collaborate and communicate: Team up with product managers, producers, designers, artists, and QA to plan, voice ideas or concerns, and deliver features on time and to spec. Maintain a strong presence as a remote team member.
• Build LiveOps tools: Develop and improve internal tools, including admin interfaces for A/B testing, to empower the team to manage live content and features.
• Follow Agile practices: Participate in sprint planning, provide accurate estimations, meet development milestones, and adapt to evolving priorities.

Required Skills & Experience: The Skills

• Extensive development experience: 7+ years of professional software development, with significant experience building backend systems, web services, or game servers.
• Backend expertise: Deep understanding of server architecture, having dealt with performance tuning, concurrency, scalability, and reliability.
• PHP proficiency: Strong knowledge of PHP, or at least one common server programming language (C#, Python, Java) and the ability to quickly become effective in our PHP codebase.
• English fluency: Excellent written and spoken English skills.
• Strong communication: Able to proactively communicate progress, flag issues, and ask for help. Must be engaged in meetings, even as a remote participant.
• Ownership mindset: Take responsibility for work, ensuring features are tested, stable, and delivered on time. Proactively address blockers and fix issues immediately.
• Debugging skills: Experience debugging complex issues in a live environment, quickly producing robust fixes.
• Adaptability: Thrives in picking up new technologies or diving into large codebases, ramping up quickly to deliver results.

Preferred Qualifications: Nice to Have

• Game development experience.
• Unity (C#) experience and ability to contribute to client-side code.
• Familiarity with live operations, feature flagging, and A/B test design (LiveOps and analytics).
• Experience with version control (Git) and build pipelines (Jenkins).
• Database knowledge: Understanding of database design, optimization, and query performance (SQL and NoSQL, preferably Couchbase).
• Experience with large player populations or high-traffic systems in production (High-scale systems).

Compensation and Benefits: The Reward

• Competitive project-based compensation.
• Opportunity to work on exciting and diverse projects.
• Clear communication and support throughout the project duration.
• Flexibility in project timelines and deadlines.
• Potential for long-term collaboration on future projects.
• Transparent and fair evaluation of your work.

What to Expect from the Process

1. Profile Preselection: Our Talent Acquisition team will review your profile.
2. Talent Acquisition Screening: Selected candidates will be contacted to undergo an initial interview to discuss their experience, skills, and fit for the role.
3. Test: Qualified candidates will be invited to complete an assessment to demonstrate their abilities.
4. Interviews: Finalists will participate in technical and cultural interviews to assess their proficiency and compatibility with our team.