Codecks vs Hacknplan
We love to see more tools specifically made for game developers! Hacknplan is a good tool, but (we might be biased here) we think Codecks is the better Hacknplan alternative. Here's why:
The interface
Made for game developers, by game developers
The team creating Codecks has many years of development experience having worked on big AAA games as well as tiny indie games and we think it shows. In Codecks you will find that we poured all our learnings into the best tool for game developers, made by game developers.
Fantastic UX is not optional
We go to great lengths to deliver a playful and joyful experience. In Codecks everything is rich with visual information - including your beautiful deck and card images. This is the tool that not only your producer will love, but everybody on your team: from artist to programmer, from designer to writer.
We're improving fast
Like Hacknplan, Codecks launched in 2015. When you scan our changelog, you'll notice that we're still constantly working on fresh and unique ideas. Barely a week goes by without substantial improvements to the tool and we're going faster as we learn more from you.
Managing projects
Workflow as part of a card
Hacknplan uses standard Kanban-style lanes for indicating a card's progress, Codecks uses an innovative design language incoroporating this information within each card. You'll quickly learn that a gray or brown card hasn't been started yet, while blue means "in progress" and green cards are "done". There are also distinct colors for blocked cards and cards in review.
Space for all your ideas
Codecks uses decks as container for cards. This allows you to create a deck for each feature type to slice your backlog into manageable chunks. Hundreds of cards can be effectively managed this way and if you feel you need an even higher level of abstraction, Codecks offers a great multi-project support allowing you to manage several projects in parallel or separately.
Let's have a conversation about conversations
Having productive conversations is a corner-piece of any successful project managed by more than one person. This is why we focused a lot of our attention to nail this part of the process. We have come up with a unique conversation system that is aimed at preventing loose ends.
Each idea deserves its own thread
All too often it happens that people get notified of a comment but are not in a position to reply right away. Hardly any tool approaches this common problem effectively and Hacknplan suffers from the same issues. Codecks employs a few ideas to ensure that the no comment gets lost. First off, every conversation happens inside a thread. This not only allows to have separate discussions on a single cards, but also allows you to define who is part of a conversation and whether this conversation can be closed.
Who takes part and did we come to a conclusion?
When creating a conversation, you may select the participants either from a list of common conversation partners or by simply mentioning them in your message. Every participant will get notified of this conversation and Codecks ensures that the conversation comes to a conclusion by regularly reminding all participants of any open conversation. If people feel like they can't contribute any more, they can always opt out.
Highlight important conversations
Even more interestingly, two workflow states are directly bound to conversations. Both, blocking a card and reviews, are initiated by starting a conversation. The card will remain in that highly visible state and send regular reminders to all participants until the conversation has been marked as resolved.
Build your Community
Open Development
Community building is an integral part of games marketing now and Codecks has unseen support for transparent development built-in right to its core. Unlike in Hacknplan you can share as much or little as you want with your fans.
Discord Community
Our Discord bot Decky goes beyond simple notifications. It will listen for feedback and bug reports from your players. Create cards inside Codecks automatically for feedback that passes certain upvoting thresholds, reply to users right from inside of Codecks and keep your community engaged and growing with automatic notifications and leaderboards.
Public Decks
Public decks allows you to share parts of your projects on the web. Use it to share your roadmap or get your community excited by sharing tasks that you're currently working on. Check the amazing projects that are already sharing their projects here.
Codecks is an order of magnitude above all project management solutions we've used before. I've used other integrated tools before, but this takes it to a whole new level.
Felipe Falanghe
Kerbal Space Program / Floating Origin Interactive
