Codecks 2.0 – For Game Developers by Game Developers

We have some exciting news to share: Codecks and Maschinen-Mensch are joining forces! 🎉

Breaking news at #TalkAndPlay! @maschimensch & @codecks_io have joined forces to create the best project management tool for game developers – find out more and sign up at https://t.co/mLmcXZgsm3 pic.twitter.com/AKNKmoSqx9

— BerlinGameScene.com (@BerlinGamez) May 21, 2019

What does this mean for Codecks?

In short: more resources and a renewed laser focus on game developers. Creating games can be extremely complex (more often than not). Why deal with overly complicated enterprise tools that were created for trendy startups, which have different processes, challenges and cultures than game companies. We can do better than that. Our goal is simply to be the best project management tool for game development.

This goes beyond just being another Trello alternative or Jira replacement. We believe that game developers face unique challenges that deserve unique solutions and innovation.

• How to manage your game design documents?
• How to motivate your whole team to work with your planning tools?
• How to estimate recurring game asset productions?
• How to manage the huge amounts of game feedback?
• How to allow open development so that fans can follow your game progress?
• How to have fun while doing game production planning?

These are the challenges we think about every day and that we’re tackling.

What are we up to next?

We’re working on some exciting new features. All of them focused on helping with actual challenges that game developers face every day. Here’s are some ideas that we’re currently exploring:

• We’re just in the last testing stage of our improved multi project support to allow you to handle multiple projects easily. More on that very soon.
• We’re working on an awesome discord integration, that allows your devs to communicate with Codecks from discord, but even more importantly will help with managing the feedback of your players and fans where they already are and have fun while doing it.
• We like Unity and Unreal and are looking into building engine support to Codecks. Wouldn’t it be pretty sweet being able to submit bugs from your game directly into Codecks?
• Game developers not only have to manage a large list of actionable tasks but also manage a shared game vision and keep track of tons of ideas in different stages. Sometimes these very vague, sometimes extremely detailed. Historically some of that was handled via Game Design Documents. We think those are a bit outdated though. We want to contribute our own version of how we think a modern GDD should work.

We’ll release more details about these ideas in the coming weeks and months. More than anything we’re interested in your feedback on what you love and hate about Codecks right now. What is missing? Which is the biggest pain of game planning that you want to see solved?

If you don’t have a Codecks account yet, sign up for free! Let us know your thoughts via email or twitter directly!

Who is Maschinen-Mensch?

Maschinen-Mensch is a German independent game studio of former AAA developers (Spec Ops: The Line) that left the mainstream industry to create indie games. The company was formed in 2014 by Johannes Kristmann and Riad Djemili to create their lovely debut title “Curious Expedition”. From humble beginnings their team has grown to 12 persons and they are working on the successor Curious Expedition 2 now.

In 2015 Maschinen-Mensch and Studio Fizbin also founded the first Berlin indie game collective Saftladen, which Codecks has been a part of since almost the beginning. Everyone of the 33 amazing members is working on games here.

Maschinen-Mensch has been using Codecks in production for over 3 years now and are so convinced of it, that we’re making it official: we’re together now!

We're Maschinen-Mensch!

Busy working on Curious Expedition 2 right now! Also @codecks_io the beautiful project management tool for games. Super proud of this team. 😊#indiegames #indiedev pic.twitter.com/Z4v6FkBszP

— Maschinen-Mensch (@maschimensch) June 21, 2019