We're looking for a game designer

Hey! Typing this is Adriaan de Jongh, director and co-founder of Hidden Folks. We're looking for a game designer in the Netherlands to help build games in The Hidden Folks Universe, starting with a sequel to the indie hit game Hidden Folks. This is a full time (4–day or 5–day work week), fully remote, and permanent position with an expected starting salary between €3000 and €3400 per month based on experience.

We will be accepting applications until January 23, 2026.

Hidden Folks 2

As a sequel to the 2017 hit game Hidden Folks, Hidden Folks 2 is a searching game where players are tasked to find little people who are hiding inside or behind things. Like in the original, the worlds in Hidden Folks 2 are filled to the brim with little stories, quick and small interactions, and funny mouth sounds. To help players find hidden folks, they are gradually introduced to new themes and new interactions to reveal the targets, while cheeky clues hint at the general locations of targets in each world.

Every part of the game requires careful consideration as well as a lot of 'actually putting the things together'. As a game designer on Hidden Folks 2, you will:

• work with a programmer to design hundreds of player ↔ world interactions.
• implement and iterate on the interactions in every world.
• work with an illustrator to design the worlds and its targets.
• work with a writer to design clues for the targets.
• work with the team to design UI with UX in mind.
• playtest and improve the player experience.

I (Adriaan) was game designer for the original Hidden Folks, but will primarily be an advisor, mentor, and manager to this project focussing on facilitating the team, business, marketing, and community management instead.

The Hidden Folks Universe

Hidden Folks 1 and 2 are part of a larger universe that serves as an inspiration for more games. In truth, we don't precisely know yet what this universe is all about! We can imagine that games in this universe are playful, accessible, perhaps invoke curiosity, but other than that: being a game designer at our company during this time is an opportunity to figure this out with us.

As a game designer on future games within The Hidden Folks Universe, you can expect to:

• help define the vision for each game and guard it throughout development.
• work with a programmer to design game mechanics, game systems, tools for content creation, and more.
• design and implement content.
• design and implement UI.
• design how code, art, and audio come together.
• playtest each game rigorously.
• strive for a juicy, fun, accessible player experience.

Requirements

If you think you can do this job but don't meet all the requirements, please apply anyway. To apply for this job, there is one hard requirement:

• You live in the Netherlands.

The soft requirements to apply for this job are as follows:

• You have experience with designing games from start to finish. This is deliberately vague and can mean different things, such as:
• You designed multiple game jam games.
• You've been part of a larger team making multiple commercial games.
• You lead the design of one or more commercial games from start to finish.
• It is your dream to make games that are accessible to everyone.
• You enjoy getting into the nitty-gritty details of all the elements that contribute to the player experience.
• You have experience working within a team. You are reasonable, willing to learn to work together, open to the ideas of others, and not afraid to take responsibility.
• You're proficient in English.
• You have full-time (32 or 40 hours per week) availability from February or March 2026.

Additionally, it helps if you have experience with:

• Making multi-platform, multi-input, localized games.
• Making games using the Godot game engine.
• Programming; and more specifically, Godot's GDScript.
• GIT, Notion, and team chat.

What we can offer

We offer a healthy, safe, and rewarding work environment. A key part of creating that environment is an ongoing dialog about your wants and needs, with the following as a starting point:

• A market conform salary for a permanent position. Purely as an indication, based on a 40 hour work week, and depending on your experience, we expect to be paying a gross salary between €3000 and €3400 for this role.
• A flexible and fully remote work environment with the option between a 32- or a 40-hour work week. We strive to be family friendly, avoid crunch and overtime, and to facilitate a good work-life balance.
• A support structure including regular one-on-ones, feedback processes, and goal setting.
• Benefits such as bonuses based on studio performance, 28 vacation days per year, time and a budget to grow and learn, four games of your choosing per year, expenses covered on select conference tickets and travel, and more.

How we hire

To respect your time as well as our time, and to make sure we're picking the right candidate for the job, this is how the process will look — with fewer candidates at each step:

1. You email us, and we confirm we got your email.
2. If you seem like particularly a good match, we do a video call to say hi and ask questions (from either side).
3. If you're one of our favorite candidates, we do another video call with the whole team where we ask you to present work you're most proud of.
4. If you're our likely pick, we may ask you for references.
5. We convene, pick a candidate, and offer you the job.

You'll receive an email confirming your application within three business days. If you were not picked for this role, we'll let you know at the end of the process. Due to the high amount of applicants, we are not able to provide feedback to most applicants, but if you would like feedback, do ask!

How to apply

To get a good picture of you, please send us an email including:

• your CV or LinkedIn profile.
• a link to your portfolio if you have one (it's not mandatory).
• a paragraph or two about why you'd like to work on the Hidden Folks universe.

Please send your email before or on January 23rd, 2026 to: applygd2026@hiddenfolks.com

About the Hidden Folks company

Hidden Folks is a small game studio in the Netherlands building playful black & white games within The Hidden Folks Universe. The studio is led by game designer Adriaan de Jongh, who co-founded the studio with illustrator Sylvain Tegroeg. In 2017, Adriaan and Sylvain released the game Hidden Folks to great success and critical acclaim, and now, 8 years later, they are looking to expand the game's universe beyond the original game.

More about the Hidden Folks company here.