Game Design Secrets

Remote Game Developer Resources

Here are the resources Tiger Style founder Randy Smith recommends for developing games with a remote team:

“Tiger Style relies heavily on Google’s suite of free services. We use Google Chat for video conferencing and often keep text windows open all day to stay in touch. We sometimes use Skype if we need a three-way (or more) video conference. Our company e-mail list goes through Google Groups and is an important part of our company culture, since it helps build a sense of team identity. We use Google Docs to store important files, such as task lists that need to be looked at and revised by many people frequently, and we also use Google Docs running alongside a video chat window to collaborate in real time on things like the copy for our App Description.

“For source control we use Subversion. All source control solutions have their pros and cons, but we like Subversion for its lack of overhead, minimum number of steps, and good integration into XCode. In addition to storing our buildable project files in Subversion, we have enormous ‘working’ folders where source files, reference images, design documents, and so forth live and can be updated by the entire team.

“We use LeFora for an internal forum to post and discuss in-progress art, although that hasn’t been adopted as readily. We’ve experimented a bit with fancy collaborative software like virtual whiteboards, but nothing has really caught on there. The key seems to be that effective collaboration ...