8 Tips for Effective Mobile Game Co-Development

As the mobile gaming market keeps growing, new mobile games are getting introduced every day. There are more than 477,000 games available on Google Play, and over 1,000,000 games are on Apple’s App Store. To compete in a growing market, the games keep getting bigger and more intricate, which is why one single team is often not able to service the whole production process. Here’s where mobile game co-development comes into play.

When it comes to mobile game co-development 2021, the process has become much easier to organize. More and more game app developers work from home, and most of them are already used to project management tools that assist in the process. This makes co-development relationships easier to set up and maintain.

If you’re wondering how you can make game app co-development work effectively and productively, we’ve prepared a set of tips that might help you. Let’s take a closer look at the topic to answer the question “What is co-development for a mobile game?” and find out what you need to design the perfect game with other game app developers.

Why Does Good Co-Development Bring Better Results?

While at first cooperative development for a mobile game was about filling in the staffing shortages, it is usually no longer that simple. The cooperative development of a game application is mostly about getting a new, fresh perspective on the concept and its realization from someone who has experience in the field.

In this scenario, coop game devs are not just a talent for hire; they become a natural extension of the original development team. They get invested and passionate about the project and become strategic assets.

The experience of AAA gaming titles shows that this kind of approach works great. A large production house can effectively cooperate with a smaller team that has shown a unique style of game design to make the end product special and exciting to the players.

If the approach works for major gaming titles, why wouldn’t the mobile game co-development process bring results? So, if you want to create a game for an iPhone or an Android device, but you don’t have enough skilled or experienced developers on your team, coop mobile game development could be a solution for you.

8 Tips for Effective Game App Co-Development

1. Get to Know the Co-Development Team

One of the essential mobile game co-development tips is to learn more about the personal and professional strengths and weaknesses of the members of the co-development team.

This is an important step to take because it will allow you to adjust your strategies and manage the development process better. Furthermore, establishing a personal connection will be necessary for setting up effective communication channels.

2. Establish a Communication Line Between the Teams

Communication is vital for effective cooperation in game app co-development. People need to have a space to share their ideas and brainstorm complex tasks to get to the optimal solution.

If you want to achieve effective co-development for a mobile game, you need to account for cultural differences in communication. Another problem that might arise is the time differences if your teams work in different parts of the world. All in all, proper expectations need to be set up, and additional communication channels for personal discussions might be helpful in that regard.

3. Try to Build Personal Relationships

Another important step in the mobile game co-development guide is to encourage building personal relationships between the team members. When it comes to long-term cooperation, it can be detrimental for developers to remain on strictly professional terms.

Establishing personal relationships will help both teams to feel like one whole unit working towards a common goal. Furthermore, it will make the overall atmosphere more casual, thus making it easier to start a conversation on certain design issues and find a compromise on them.

4. Communicate Your Vision Clearly

Before you develop a mobile game in cooperation, define the goals you want to achieve with your project and overall determine your vision. These points need to be clearly communicated and discussed with your partner so that your core team and co-development team are on the same page.

While some of your goals should be set in stone (like the deadline for the project), remember that certain elements will change as the game goes through the development process.

5. Aim to Be Agile

Adaptability and flexibility are essential at any one of the game app co-development stages. While your initial vision might be hard to let go of, in many cases, it is better to rely on the experience and expertise of your co-developers and trust the changes they offer.

Make sure that the team you’re working with can adjust to you as well. Compromising and finding a middle ground will most likely result in a better solution. At the end of the day, it all comes down to your communication skills and how well you can listen to your teammates.

6. Establish an Effective Feedback Process

Feedback is often considered as something done at the end of the project, as an evaluation of the job done. However, an effective feedback loop can help you catch potential issues early on. It is also helpful for early conflict resolution.

An efficient feedback loop needs to be established both for your core team and for your co-development partners. Try not to play favorites and treat every issue with the same scrutiny. Positive feedback can also be effective in determining the best co-development strategies.

7. Prepare Your Tools

Productive cooperation in mobile game co-development is usually preceded by an extensive preparation stage. Choosing the proper tools and making sure that they suit your goals and work on every device you need is one of the most important parts of this stage.

The tools you use can be as simple or complex as you need. For example, to checklist tasks, you can use Google Keep, or something more customizable, like Trello boards. Just make sure that the solution you choose is familiar to everyone.

8. Focus on Satisfying the End Users

Holding onto your initial vision too strictly can be detrimental to your project. Not only does it not leave any room for improvement, it almost defeats the purpose of co-developing your mobile game with another team, as you reject their ideas on the final product.

Remember that your main goal should remain the satisfaction of the end users. So, even if the idea contradicts your initial vision or does not suit the spirit of the game, at least consider it if it is fun and unique enough.

Where Can You Find a Co-Development Team?

As we’ve mentioned, multiple development teams work online from home right now, which makes them available for hire as co-developers. However, there also are scammers that might try to siphon money from you under the guise of cooperation.

One of the workarounds for this issue is using one of the established online resources for a development job search. These include Upwork, YouTeam, and many more. They moderate their user base, and it is much less likely that you’ll find a scammer there.

Another place to look for someone to co-develop a mobile game with is on one of the development forums. You can visit sites like IndieDB and Develteam to find someone with the exact skills you need.

Choose Pingle Studio as Your Co-Development Partner

Developers at Pingle Studio have had a wide variety of video game co-development experiences. We’ve worked with both big development studios and small indie developers, and in all cases, we’ve assisted with promptly bringing their vision to life.

One of the projects we’ve co-developed was Beyond the Steel Sky from Revolution Software. We’ve worked on optimizing the game for Apple devices, and, in a short turnaround, we’ve managed to get it accepted to Apple Arcade.

Another example of our successful co-development efforts is Lost Ember – a beautiful and unique action game with a memorable world. Our job was to optimize the game’s performance and port it to several consoles, which we did in just 4 months.

All in all, if you need help bringing your idea to life and strengthening your current team, Pingle Studio is the partner you need.

In Conclusion

Effective mobile game co-development requires some time and skills to set up. It is also essential to the success of your game to find experienced partners you can trust. Contact us at Pingle Studio, and we’ll assist you with any game development project you have.