Whether you have a dedicated project manager in your game development team or not, you have to treat the game as what it is — a project. That is, if you want to finish it on time and within budget.
So, even as a game developer, you can and should use project management tools and practices to organize your efforts, thereby enjoying their many benefits.
Luckily for you, I’ve compiled a list of the 7 best project management tools for game development to help you find the perfect fit. Read on to find out how each app stands out!
Table of Contents
Top 7 game project management tools
Task management is the most important aspect of any project management software. And, it’s just as important for video game developers since all PM tools are built around task management.
This essentially means you can use any PM tool to manage game projects, and it will work.
However, if you want the best tools that cater specifically to game development, then the following 7 are the ones to look out for.
| Software | Free plan | Pricing (starting at) | Available for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Plaky | ✔ | $3.99/seat/month | web, iOS, Android |
| HacknPlan | ✔ | $48 flat | web |
| Codecks | ✔ | €5/user/month | web |
| Jira | ✔ | $875 for 1–10 users | web, Windows, macOS, Linux, Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, Android, iOS |
| Trello | ✔ | $5/user/month | web, Windows, macOS, Android, iOS |
| ClickUp | ✔ | $7/user/month | web, Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, iOS |
| Asana | ✔ | $10.99/user/month | web, Windows, macOS, Android, iOS |
1. Plaky — best free game project management software
Available platforms: web, iOS, Android
| Plaky’s plans | Plaky’s pricing |
|---|---|
| Free | $0 |
| Pro | $3.99/seat/month* |
| Enterprise | $8.99/seat/month* |
*billed annually
Plaky is a free and powerful project management tool that offers enough flexibility and customization features to conform to the needs of any game development project.
In its free plan, Plaky doesn’t limit the number of users who can join your Space (that’s where your project boards are). So, your Spaces can always be scaled to accommodate the growth of your development team.
Plus, since Plaky primarily focuses on task management and workflow optimization, it lets you create the perfect organizational structure for each team — and each stage of game development.
Plaky’s best features for game development
Aside from its generous free plan with unlimited users, projects, and tasks, Plaky’s standout feature for game development is its customizability.
Everything can be customized to fit the needs of your project and the teams working on it. Furthermore, different user roles in Plaky allow you to control the access level of any external collaborators.
You get full control over the description and types of custom fields, including but not limited to:
- Assignees,
- Status,
- Priority,
- Reviewers,
- Due dates,
- Links, and so on.
You can also customize the way this information is visually presented using 2 different views:
- Table view — get a condensed overview of key project information at once, and
- Kanban view — organize tasks into custom Kanban columns.
Each team can customize their Spaces differently, which includes using their preferred views.
For example, the level design team may perform best with a Kanban board while the multiplayer backend team prefers their tasks organized in lists. Either way, this can easily be arranged in Plaky.
A Gantt chart view — which lets you visually track your whole project timeline — is also available with Plaky’s paid plans.
What’s new in Plaky: Plaky’s most recent upgrades include subtasks, the conditional coloring of tasks and fields, and the ability to shift dates and timelines in bulk.
Try Plaky for free2. HacknPlan — best for Kanban-style game project management
Available platforms: web
| HacknPlan’s plans | HacknPlan’s pricing |
|---|---|
| Personal | $0 |
| Personal Plus | $48 flat |
| Studio | $72/seat/year |
HacknPlan is a Kanban-oriented project management tool created specifically for game development.
Out of the box, boards come with pre-made categories for grouping tasks by:
- Programming,
- Art,
- Sound, etc.
As far as task management goes, it’s your standard fare task card drag-and-dropping that all Kanban workflows utilize. However, HacknPlan does add a few elements that not all similar platforms have, such as linking task dependencies.
This means that when you’re creating a task, you can list which other activities must be completed before it can be unlocked.
For example, if you’re creating an NPC, you can’t make the 3D model until the character design and concept art are made. So, until these conditions are met, the 3D modeling task will feature a locked icon.
HacknPlan’s best features for game development
HacknPlan’s standout game development feature is the Game Design Model (GDM).
The GDM serves as your main game design document — the most crucial piece of documentation for defining the project vision and keeping everyone on the same page.
The main problem with game design documentation is keeping it alive and regularly updated, especially once project teams get big.
HacknPlan’s GDM feature streamlines this documentation by linking it with task management. This turns a normally static and disparate document into a dynamic and interlinked part of the development process.
An integrated game design document like this also allows you to track the metrics of each game design element in real time. For example, you can easily check how well the 2D art is progressing or how the UI is coming along.
What’s new in HacknPlan: According to the latest available info, the only novelties are HacknPlan’s pricing changes effective as of August 27, 2024 and the reshuffling of features across the tool’s free and paid plans.
3. Codecks — best for tracking game project milestones
Available platforms: web
| Codecks’ plans | Codecks’ pricing* |
|---|---|
| Free | €0 (up to 5 users) |
| Plus | €5/user/month |
| Pro | €9/user/month |
| Enterprise | €15/user/month |
*no annual payment
Codecks is yet another game development-specific project management tool, only this one has a unique spin — trading cards.
Namely, task management is split into 3 windows:
- Hand — which contains personal cards visible only to the user,
- Decks — groups of cards that are visible to multiple relevant people, and
- Timeline — which I’ll cover as Codecks’s best game development feature.
The idea is that you draw cards (tasks) from a deck and then play the cards from your hand, or in this case — perform the tasks you’ve drawn.
The task cards make use of Markdown, which is great for flexible formatting. However, for large teams that include people whose positions don’t require tech-savviness, this might make the workflow more complex overall.
Codecks’s best features for game development
The card-playing approach to task organization and sorting is unique. But it’s not the best feature this game development tool has to offer.
Instead, I have to highlight the timeline feature.
This feature allows you to mark a date on the project timeline and effortlessly assign tasks to it. You can then track the team’s collective progress toward this milestone.
This is especially useful when the team needs to prepare something, like a presentation or a demo, for a specific event. It also comes in handy when you want to narrow down the number of cards to keep track of and only focus on the cards related to a specific milestone.
In general, Codecks isn’t the only tool with this kind of feature, but its milestones are the most intuitive to use.
What’s new in Codecks: Codecks’ latest release includes the addition of the Guardian System, which allows for more intuitive workflow customization and permission control within decks.
4. Jira — best for Scrum game project management
Available platforms: web, Windows, macOS, Linux, Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, Android, iOS
| Jira’s plans | Jira’s pricing |
|---|---|
| Free | $0 (up to 10 users) |
| Standard | $875 for 1–10 users* |
| Premium | $1,700 for 1–10 users* |
| Enterprise | $155,000 for 801–1000 users (must be billed annually) |
*billed annually
Jira is a project management tool made by developers, for developers.
This is both a positive and a negative.
If you’re part of a big company and want to implement a project management solution for everyone across all departments — then Jira shouldn’t be your top pick.
Why? Well, since it’s so powerful, Jira is also rather easy to break if you don’t know what you’re doing.
In short, Jira’s developer-first philosophy leaves a lot to be desired for other teams. And, the company that made Jira — Atlassian — knows this, or they wouldn’t have acquired Trello in 2017 and continued support to cater to non-developers.
On the upside, most games are made by smaller teams that may only consist of developers. In this case, Jira might be an appealing choice.
Jira’s best features for game development
While all project management tools featured on this list support Agile game development, they mostly do so with the help of Kanban boards.
Jira, on the other hand, supports both Kanban and Scrum workflows.
When creating a task — in addition to adding features like task dependencies and milestones (called Epic Links) — Jira allows you to immediately make the task a part of a Sprint.
While this feature may be simple, it could be critical for game development teams that use Scrum. Plus, there are even Sprint reports.
What’s new in Jira: Jira’s most recent updates include an improved response to security changes, the introduction of the Data Center Security Hub, and finally, a dark theme.
5. Trello — best for a transparent game development process
Available platforms: web, Windows, macOS, Android, iOS
| Trello’s plans | Trello’s pricing |
|---|---|
| Free | $0 |
| Standard | $5/user/month* |
| Premium | $10/user/month* |
| Enterprise | $17.50/user/month (minimum 50 users)* |
*billed annually
Trello is one of the most popular and well-established Kanban board-oriented PM tools out there. To put things in perspective, both HacknPlan and Codecks market themselves as Trello for game developers.
Now, as a Kanban board, Trello is amazingly polished. However, aside from this basic functionality of dragging and dropping task cards from one column into the next, Trello doesn’t offer anything out of the ordinary.
Users can customize their Kanban boards to support a wide range of different development pipelines with Power-Ups — additional functionalities that include different views, integrations, and features. But, searching for relevant features in a list of 200+ Power-Ups, installing them, and then testing them out can be bothersome.
Still, if all you need is a Kanban board, then Trello has got you covered. It could be a good pick for solo projects or small development teams.
Trello’s best features for game development
One of Trello’s most unique features for game development is the ability to make certain boards publicly available for viewing.
You’ll often see certain Kickstarter or Patreon-backed games do this to show the state and progress of game development to the project backers.
If you’re considering this type of funding for your project and you don’t have a lot of people working on it, you can use Trello to show your fans and backers how the game is coming along.
What’s new in Trello: As of July 2024, users can change their own public Power-Up Iframe Connector Url domains without having to contact Trello.
💡 Plaky Pro Tip
Check out our breakdown of Trello’s pricing plans here:
6. ClickUp — best for integrations with other apps
Available platforms: web, Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, iOS
| ClickUp’s plans | ClickUp’s pricing |
|---|---|
| Free | $0 |
| Unlimited | $7/user/month* |
| Business | $12/user/month* |
| Enterprise | POA |
*billed annually
Like most entries on this list, ClickUp is a generalist project management tool.
While it doesn’t cater specifically to game development, ClickUp can support a wide variety of teams and workflows in the creative project management field — game development included.
Similar to Plaky, you can view your tasks in ClickUp in either a Kanban board view or a task list view. For every task, you can also add assignees, due dates, priorities, and other similar data.
ClickUp’s best features for game development
One of ClickUp’s most unique features is its connected search feature, which lets you connect ClickUp with other apps you’re using and use the search bar to pull up tasks from those apps — without leaving ClickUp.
For game dev teams whose jobs require them to juggle development, design, marketing, etc., this feature can be rather helpful.
You can easily search for a GitHub task, a Google Drive file, or a Google Calendar event, all in the same place. Essentially, you don’t have to log into each of those apps separately, which should help minimize distractions and maximize productivity.
What’s new in ClickUp: ClickUp now lets you use nested formulas and edit custom relationships in bulk.
💡 Plaky Pro Tip
Check out our comparison of ClickUp’s pricing plans below:
7. Asana — best for workload management
Available platforms: Web, Windows, macOS, Android, iOS
| Asana’s plans | Asana’s pricing |
|---|---|
| Personal | $0 (up to 10 users) |
| Starter | $10.99/user/month* |
| Advanced | $24.99/user/month* |
| Enterprise | POA |
| Enterprise+ | POA |
*billed annually
Lastly, there’s Asana, another generalist project management tool with multiple views, granular task management, and in-task communication.
What sets it apart is that, like Jira, Asana is another tool for Agile project management that features automated Sprints for Scrum teams.
Asana’s best features for game development
Game development can be messy, with lots of shifting priorities and evolving requirements.
So, in addition to all the standard project management features, Asana helps your team members avoid burnout and spread work evenly thanks to its workload feature.
This feature keeps track of resource loading per member and uses simple color-coding to signal how crammed someone’s schedule is.
That way, Asana helps your team stay Lean by avoiding mura — waste caused by uneven workload.
What’s new in Asana: You can now reply to comments in bulk using AI chat, edit team content permissions (for admins), and copy information from Asana dashboards into external apps.
💡 Plaky Pro Tip
Compare all of Asana’s pricing plans in our detailed guide:
What is game development project management software?
Game development project management software is any tool that offers the core functionalities and features that facilitate the development of video games in particular.
Essentially, game planning software is supposed to help you with:
- Task management,
- Project planning,
- Communication,
- Time management,
- Documentation, and
- Reporting.
That said, project management software for game development usually has the same core functionalities as a regular PM tool. In general, its purpose is to give you insight into:
- Project deliverable progress,
- Task priority,
- Schedule,
- Workload division, and more.
How to choose the right PM tool for your game development project
What do a donkey, a horse, a mule, and a camel have in common?
They’re all beasts of burden.
Sure, you could point out many differences among them, but at the end of the day, they are used to accomplish the same goal.
The situation with the tools featured in this article is not too different, as strange as this comparison may seem.
When you break it all down, they are all creative project management tools that can be used for game development. In other words — they all offer the basic features you need to manage game development projects.
So, when choosing the right PM tool for your game, you should focus on the following:
- Pricing,
- Visual orientation, and
- Unique features.
Pricing
Considering how similar most of the tools on this list are, their price tags are rather diverse.
It’s important to understand not just the features a project management tool has, but also the price point these features are locked behind.
Many tools try to limit their free plans (if they even have them). They do so by either:
- Hiding important features behind a paywall or
- Putting a hard cap on the number of people who can work on free plan projects.
For example:
- Asana’s free plan limits collaboration to 10 people — the cost difference between limiting your team to 10 people and onboarding the 11th team member amounts to over $1,400 annually.
- HacknPlan’s free plan doesn’t limit the number of users, but it does withhold key functionalities, such as card fields, filters, Kanban column customization for personalized workflows, etc.
- Codecks goes a step beyond, locking its due date feature behind its second paid plan. So, users who don’t want to pay €5/user/month can’t set task deadlines.
Conversely, Plaky is a platform that offers all of these features in its free plan, including unlimited users and due dates.
Try Plaky for freeVisual orientation
Another key factor has to do with your preferred way of organizing tasks.
The 3 most popular layouts include:
- Kanban boards,
- Task lists, and
- Sprints.
Objectively, there is no right answer here — it all depends on your and your teams’ preferences.
Most game developers like to use Kanban boards, while some teams simply prefer a list view. Either way, it’s not uncommon for game development to include several teams with different preferences.
This is why tools like Plaky or ClickUp, which allow you to switch between different views at the click of a button, are so accommodating for large teams.
That said, if your team swears by the Scrum framework, then Jira or Asana are the natural picks.
Unique features
Last but not least — never underestimate the power of unique features.
Some features are worth making compromises for. So, see how well the feature set of a given tool aligns with the long-term vision for your game development project(s).
For example, there’s nothing quite like HacknPlan’s Game Design Model for integrating and updating your game design documentation. So, if this is important to you, then perhaps it’s worth trading customizable Kanban columns for it.
Likewise, Plaky’s ability to accommodate rapid team growth without holding your project hostage until you cough up more cash is a huge plus. This is especially useful for ambitious and complex projects that hope to grow and attract more talent throughout development.
Create a free Plaky account💡 Plaky Pro Tip
If you’re undecided on the perfect tool for you, take a break and look at these programming memes:
Take your game development to the next level
Without project management tools, game development is left without an organizational foothold.
The more people are involved in a project, the more difficult it is to manage without a centralized platform that maintains its vision and streamlines production pipelines.
However, choosing a PM tool at random can incur more costs than benefits — both monetary and otherwise.
All the tools featured in this guide are excellent in their own ways. But, to find the right one for your team, you should always ask yourself:
- What features your team needs,
- Which layout works best for them, and
- What your budget is.
A Venn diagram of these 3 aspects will reveal the perfect tool for you in the middle. And if you look closely — Plaky will stand out as the top choice.
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