Looking for help, tips, guidance on RTS project from people with development exp.

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3
  1. What said
  2. Have the game design ready before you start doing anything else, make sure it is fun to play (some books say that you should even make a paper prototype, but I don’t know how appropriate that is for an RTS)
  3. When you enter the development, split the big tasks into smaller ones - e.g. Unit Movement -> Unit movement animation/Unit pathfinding/Unit Sounds (not the best example). This will give you better overview of the total amount of work that is to be done.
  4. You should use a source control - git is free, slightly hard to learn at first, perforce is also free for up to 10 people I think; A task managment system - Jira is ok, but paid, there are some free ones - Version1 for up to 6 people I think.
  5. In my previous workplace I had this routine: Game designer generates a document describing a gameplay feature in a great detail -> A programmer does a “first pass” to the feature -> The programmer shows the feature to the designer -> The designer does some adjustments to the feature (hopefully minimal) -> The programmer polishes the feature