Hi all,

In the pursuit of ever-improving project management for the larger projects I've been working on, I came across a few free online programs that help immensely. From doing professional development, I've become quite the fan of management tools - especially when working with a team.

As I've said in a previous blog, a good plan is important for any game project. Even small games can benefit from a proper plan. As games get larger, having a project plan (design document, task list, milestones, etc etc) gets more important. The trick is to make it painless and useful.

Todoist (http://www.todoist.com) is a simple, free task management program. While not quite as complex as paid versions (or even some other free software) it does help. Sometimes you don't need gannt charts, time-trackers, ccomplicated histories or any of the more deep stuff. Sometimes a simple heirarchical list of tasks is enough. Simple, efficient and effective.

The more interesting program I stumbled across is called Cacoo (http:www.cacoo.com). This beauty is a mockup program, also web-driven. Something like this will not be necessary for smaller, or even medium-sized games. For larger games, a tool of this type is a godsend. It's certainly easy enough to use pen and paper (and one of my colleagues would argue that's the best way) but if you're changing things constantly, this is great. Basically it's just a vector drawing program, prebuilt to use wireframes (basic shapes, and a few more complex ones). You can use a page as a backgorund to easily mock up popup boxes and menus, and the whole thing can be shared with others so is great for teams.

I'm not sure how organised others are with their projects (and if you're anything like me, its dependent on your mood at the time :P) but if you're going into a complex project, simple tools like these, used correctly, are almost guaranteed to make development easier.