Working Student (Research & Development)
You will join the Strategic Projects team to investigate emerging technologies, build rapid prototypes, and help leadership decide where to place strategic bets. This is a hands-on role where you'll build things — prototypes, teardowns, working demos, and decision-ready writeups — rather than just presenting slides about trends. You should be comfortable working with ambiguity, limited structure, and fast-changing priorities.
Responsibilities
- Evaluate emerging tech relevant to Atari's portfolio, including AI/ML in games, new engines, distribution platforms, emulation tech, modding ecosystems, and retro-tech revivals, and write teardowns with a recommendation
- Build quick proofs-of-concept with working code to stress-test whether strategic ideas are feasible
- Track the indie, experimental, and retro gaming landscape for tools, trends, and IP opportunities
- Synthesize findings into briefings that an executive can act on in 10 minutes
- Run small experiments end-to-end: define the hypothesis, build the test, report the result, and recommend the next step
- Translate prototype results into clear recommendations: pursue, park, test further, or stop
- Use AI coding tools and workflow automation tools to move faster
- Work with non-technical stakeholders and explain technical findings clearly
- Push back on bad ideas when the data says so
Requirements
- Currently enrolled student in Computer Science, Software Engineering, or a closely related technical field
- Demonstrated ability to learn unfamiliar tools fast and ship working code, shown via portfolio, GitHub, side projects, or shipped work
- Hands-on coding experience with Python, TypeScript, Node.js, and/or Java or similar programming languages
- Confident working with GitHub and other development workflows
- Experience with AI coding tools and workflow automations
- Able to quickly learn unfamiliar frameworks, APIs, SDKs, or technical environments
- Fluent in English, both written and spoken
- Strong communication skills, including in-person communication and the ability to explain technical ideas to non-technical stakeholders
- Self-directed and comfortable being given problems, not solutions
- Comfortable working with ambiguity, limited structure, and changing priorities
- Comfortable pushing back, challenging assumptions, and rethinking ideas when evidence points elsewhere
- Ability to be onsite in Münster on a hybrid schedule
- Must be eligible to work in Germany
- Based in Münster or the surrounding area