As a Lead QA Tester at The Indie Stone, your mission is to help bring projects to fruition by leading and organising the internal QA Team. The internal QA Team at The Indie Stone plays a vital role in the ongoing development of our flagship title Project Zomboid, verifying bug reports from our community, checking fixes from our developers and identifying issues themselves.

As the Lead Tester you will own the Verification of Quality, ensuring the QA Team provides the information the developers require for the delivery of stable, polished, and player ready features. You will drive testing strategy, coordinate QA efforts across the studio, and ensure issues are identified, prioritized, and resolved in line with project goals and deadlines. You will be the most knowledgeable person regarding the player readiness of our game at any one time.

What’s the Job?

Leading

• Own the bug lifecycle, including triage, prioritisation, assignment, and validation of fixes

• Lead, mentor, and develop the QA team, fostering a culture of quality and accountability

• Ensure consistent, high quality bug reporting in Jira, following established methodologies

• Take ownership of team performance, delivery, and continuous improvement

• Support team wellbeing, engagement, and professional development

• Provide coaching, feedback, and guidance to testers

• Act as a point of escalation for concerns, collaborating with HR and production when needed

Planning

• Coordinate with production to align priorities, scope, and deadlines

• Plan and allocate QA resources across features, milestones, and testing phases

• Run regular QA syncs to align on priorities, risks, and strategies

• Develop and maintain test plans, test cases, and QA documentation

• Ensure all testing milestones are met within project timelines

Cooperating

• Collaborate with developers to reproduce issues and verify resolutions

Reporting

• Ensure gathering and consolidation of feedback from all relevant sources: community discord, forums, internal channels

• Produce regular reports on QA metrics, risks, and trends

• Coordinate beta testing initiatives and community feedback channels to enhance product quality, as required

• Manage relationships with external QA partners and integrate their work into internal workflows, as required

• Be lovely

What Are We Looking For?

• Proven experience in QA within game development, including leadership or senior-level responsibility

• Strong knowledge of QA methodologies, test planning, and bug tracking

• Experience working across full development cycles: alpha, beta, release, post-launch

• Excellent communication and organizational skills

• Ability to prioritize effectively in a fast-paced, iterative environment

Bonus Points

• Familiarity with multiplayer/system-heavy games

• Experience working with community-driven feedback

• Experience with Jira

• Experience with automation or scripting

• Project Zomboid experience as a player - the more the better