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[SFBTom]

Hey guys,

So my brother and I have worked on a lot of games together, some while we were in the same room, others through the internet. We've worked with others too, in terms of voice actors and musicians, all through the internet, and despite the general consensus being that internet based game projects fail, we've only had 1 game fall through so far, out of about 20, and that was actually just involving the 2 of us.

This time though, our team is larger. While the core programming/art team of myself and my brother remains, we have an extra artist on board, a musician (who's actually just delivered the final pieces to us, waaay ahead of time!), and a small army of voice actors. I'm starting to feel that email alone isn't enough to keep everything together.

When I've worked on comercial projects with bigger teams, I've used basecamp and the likes (at the client's expense of course) to keep track of everything, and found that it helped immensely.

So: do you think a dedicated project management tool is overkill for this kind of project?

Also, does anyone have any experience with any of the FOSS project management tools out there?

[shadowdim]

I guess a Skype or IRC chat room would be enough.
And a dedicated ftp server for file sharing.

[Nix]

Nothing beats Dropbox for file sharing.

[Player 3]

And a dedicated ftp server for file sharing.

Now where can we get a free one of those, dedicated to FTP?

[Coz]

Also, does anyone have any experience with any of the FOSS project management tools out there?

I have worked in a FOSS project before, and here's how we did it:

- The mailing list was our primary method of communication
- File repository( SVN )
- A wiki for project documentation( except stuff describing the game's internals, which would be in SVN )
- An IRC channel, though most of us only got on for group meetings when we had to discuss something urgent

Take into account all the stuff that would go into the wiki; that includes a checklist of stuff that should be ready
each release( which isn't your concern if you aren't doing iterative development ), a todo list, a list of who's working on
what, etc.. Pretty much it was our project management software, except that it's easier to use and more flexible. On the other
hand, software made for project management probably is faster to use / less resource hungry.

Also if you don't know how to manage your project( which seems to be the case ), the dedicated tool probably has tutorials or
guides written for it to help you with that, and most likely the way the tool is structured guides you through the process too.
With the tools described above you need to know how to use them effectively, or you'll spend time learning.

Another reason to use the tools described above is to lower the entry barrier for contributors, that is, they are most likely to
use a known tool than install project management software they have never used, which probably doesn't applies to you.

I don't have experience with dedicated project management tools though.

[flavio]

I suggest a groupware solution, now we're using TikiWiki and it fits our needs definitely.

[doom200]

There's a great list of project management software you can find in this blog: http://www.timedoctor.com/blog/2011/02/02/43-project-management-software-alternatives

There are actually 43 other software that are listed with most software having a short review for you to have an idea of the software. You can also opt to check the comparison table which compares the various software from each other. You can also see from the table the various features a certain software can offer.

Most of the software listed have a feature of file/document sharing and can integrate Microsoft Office. Only a few though can integrate google docs to their software. They also have time tracking, scheduling or gantt chart and milestones, invoicing/billing, etc.

[InfiniteStateMachine]

I'm usually good with SVN, Skype and a forum or Trac

[dsilvers]

My team coordinates our project with a schedule on Google Docs and the files over Dropbox. Works very nicely.

[Twitch]

Google Docs, Dropbox, and Skype is us sorted.

Dropbox is a godsend for filesharing, I don't miss the days of constantly transferring zips.
Skype is also really handy for chatting to several people, some of whom may or may not be online at the time :D

[Nix]

Do most of you who use Skype use it for voice, video, or just IM?

[Twitch]

Just IM for me - I don't think I've ever used skype for calling 

[Sakar]

My friends and I generally use

Dropbox - Very easy and fast file sharing
Skype - Mostly voice, and a little IM. Our primary means of communication
Google Docs - Very nice and easy for us to share ideas and keep track of stuff

[Theophilus]

Yeah. Dropbox OWNS.

[Zaknafein]

Dropbox is great for filesharing, but I don't think it replaces a proper SCCS like SVN or Git. Even in teams with a single programmer it's a lifesaver to have proper version control, and it's not that hard to set up.