Company Profile - Exploding Kittens

Cool cats and kittens

Toy World spoke to Joeri Hoste, director of international sales at Exploding Kittens, the studio behind the best-selling card game of the same name as well as Throw Throw Burrito and the new two-player Tacocat Spelled Backwards, about the thinking behind its games and what lies ahead for 2021.

The Exploding Kittens game portfolio comprises some pretty unusual concepts; when designing your games, what major elements do you focus on?

Our mission at Exploding Kittens is to create games that make the people you’re playing with entertaining. Whether that’s hurling weaponised Mexican food in Throw Throw Burrito, or making you sound like a caveman in Poetry for Neanderthals, we want you to put down your screen and celebrate your family and friends in the room.

What do your games offer retailers from a commercial perspective, and on the flip side, what can consumers expect from playing them?

The advantage for retailers and consumers is the same - our games have wide appeal and can be enjoyed by families with kids, or adults wanting a games night. Every Exploding Kittens game is fun and strategic, and players have control over how the game is played. For example, our most recent launch, Tacocat Spelled Backwards, can be played by all levels and ages and can easily be made simpler or more strategic by using specific game tactics.

Tacocat Spelled Backwards is designed for only two players. Why is this?

We don’t often see family friendly strategy games that are designed specifically for two players, so that’s what we set out to create. Tacocat is our second two-player board game at Exploding Kittens, after A Game of Cat and Mouth, and we have plans in the pipeline to develop even more, starting with our latest launch A Little Wordy, a sneaky two-player letter tile game. Tacocat Spelled Backwards will be supported this year by a robust marketing and PR campaign including digital and social media content across Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.

Do you think the Covid-19 pandemic, and the huge upsurge in gaming that has resulted from it, have significantly changed how people approach and view the games category?

Throughout the pandemic, games have helped bring households of all sizes together for affordable and interactive entertainment, whether around a table or digitally. We want to provide our players with a library of games that inspire, challenge and appeal to a wide range of ages and abilities.

What other new games have you launched recently, and how have they been received by the trade?

In the last six months we have also released Poetry for Neanderthals, a competitive single-syllable wordguessing game in which you must ‘speak good’ or risk being hit with an inflatable “No!” stick, and A Game of Cat and Mouth, a fiercely competitive, magnetpowered Pinball-esque game that challenges players to launch balls through a cat’s mouth. The response to both games has been very positive. Customers love that Poetry for Neanderthals, which was developed and released during lockdown, can be played in person and over video chat.

Can we expect to see more new offerings as the year progresses?

We are focused on expanding our portfolio of games and our global reach throughout 2021. Our newest launch, A Little Wordy, is a two-player game for would-be word wizards and we’re looking forward to seeing our fans’ response to it. We’re also releasing new games within the Exploding Kittens and Throw Throw Burrito franchises.

Later this year we will, for the first time ever, be applying a popular animated entertainment licence to the Exploding Kittens franchise, broadening its appeal and audience even further. Game development will also expand into digital releases with the recent release of Kitty Letter, a word unscrambling mobile game, and the upcoming release of Exploding Kittens on the Nintendo Switch.