Game Design Intern (Tabletop & Card Games)

- Location: Remote
- Compensation: Royalty / Revenue Share on IP sales

About Kheeladi

Kheeladi is an indie tabletop platform and design studio that creates, publishes, and distributes original card games and high-tactility micro-systems. We bridge independent creators with modern players, focusing on emergent gameplay, low-friction mechanics, and sharp cultural satire tailored to contemporary social dynamics.

Role Summary

We are seeking a Game Design Intern to assist across the full product lifecycle of our upcoming games, from mechanical balancing to production-ready print preparation. You will collaborate with the core studio team to translate abstract thematic hooks into balanced, replayable tabletop experiences.

What You’ll Be Doing ~

We’re designing a batch of new card and micro-board games, and we need someone who loves breaking systems down to their bones and rebuilding them. You’ll be working directly on the core mechanics, drafting cards, and testing them until they feel right.

- Designing turn loops, action cards, scoring rules, and figuring out what makes a game fast and satisfying to play.
- Testing prototypes directly with players, gathering feedback, troubleshooting edge cases, and tweaking mechanics on the fly.
- Running game sessions (in person or on Tabletop Simulator), spotting where players get confused, and fixing the pacing.
- Writing transparent rules, explaining how to play without sounding like an instruction manual from 1998.

Whom We’re Looking For

- You actually play and follow modern tabletop or card games; you know why games like SushiGo!, Uno,



or Secret Hitler work mechanically and have an intuitive sense of what keeps players hooked.
- Comfortable whipping up clean vector layouts and card components in Figma or Illustrator.
- You have a sharp ear for humour, satire, and the little social dynamics that make group games tick.

Key Responsibilities

- Conceptualise, iterate, and balance mechanical loops, turn economies, asymmetric player roles, and interruption/action-card ecosystems.
- Build rapid component layouts, card hierarchies, iconography systems, and production tokens.
- Coordinate alpha/beta playtest cohorts (via physical print-and-play prototypes and digital tabletop sandboxes like Tabletop Simulator), gathering telemetry on win rates, session friction, and pacing bottlenecks.

Requirements & Technical Competencies

- Comfortable with working on Adobe Illustrator, Figma, and raster/vector design suites for rapid card generation and data merges.
- Deep understanding of modern tabletop mechanics
- Ability to quickly move from paper test sheets to polished digital mockups within iterative sprints.
- Strong intuitive grasp of adult, culturally grounded humour, narrative irony, and behavioural psychology in social party settings.
- Bonus: Prior participation in game jams/game designathons.

Compensation Model

- IP Royalty Program: This role operates under a revenue-share model. You will receive an agreed contract percentage on commercial sales of every game title and IP SKU you co-develop.
- Author Credits: Permanent named design credit in official rulebooks, packaging, and commercial listings.
- Freedom to use a fraction of your work in your design case studies. (as discussed, with consent)

📌 Board Game Design Intern (India)
🏢 Kheeladi
📍 India