Company Profile
What’s in
a game?
In January 2015, Exploding Kittens – a card game designed by Elan Lee, Shane Small and Matthew Inman from The Oatmeal - made history by becoming both the most backed project in Kickstarter history, meeting its $10,000 goal in just 20 minutes. Six and a half years later, Exploding Kittens is a respected games publisher with a raft of unique titles to its name and big plans for the future. Rachael Simpson-Jones sat down with Joeri Hoste, general manager international, to find out more about the company’s approach to the Games category and what 2022 has in store.
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oming into 2021, Exploding Kittens’ major focus was on expanding its portfolio, which comprises the Exploding Kittens franchise, the Throw Throw franchise, Tacocat Spelled Backwards and games including A Little Wordy, Poetry for Neanderthals, You’ve Got Crabs, Bears for Babies and A Game of Cat & Mouth. Previously, the company was producing two, maybe three new games in a 12-month period; now, it’s staffing up on the development side with a view to ramping the release schedule up in a big way. The events that have unfolded over the past 18 months have given Exploding Kittens the momentum and financial strength to invest in product design and new talent, with +85% YOY growth in the UK in 2020 vs. 2019. And YTD until the end of July, despite initial concerns that last year’s performance couldn’t be replicated, the company finds itself enjoying a further +50% growth. “Our performance over the past year and a half is partly due to the introduction of new titles and partly
due to the success of our existing games,” explains Joeri. “For many years, Exploding Kittens was our No.1 game and franchise, but Throw Throw Burrito, another Kickstarter success story launched in 2019, has now taken the No.1 spot at retail. It’s a higher price point, so it drives higher overall value sales, but it also delivers the numbers on units too. Although these games have been great for us, we still see the opportunity to grow. Each season, we see our unit performance and selection come on leaps and bounds, and it’s been a great first half of the year.” Connecting people through play lies at the heart of all game development. By diversifying its portfolio, Exploding Kittens is also discovering new ways to do just that, via innovation and twists on its gameplay. Unique 2-player word games A Little Wordy, a sneaky, tile-unscrambling word game for would-be word wizards, and Tacocat Spelled Backwards, a fun combination of strategy, luck and instinct, launched earlier this year when lockdowns were still in effect, and bored couples and housemates were seeking
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fresh entertainment. Both have proved exceptionally popular since arriving on the market. Exploding Kittens has also moved into the licensing space with the release of Exploding Minions, based on Illumination’s smash-hit franchise, which is distributed by Universal Pictures. Far from slapping the licence over the top of its predecessor and calling it a day, the company has delved deep into the animated property to bring fans reimagined artwork by The Oatmeal’s Matthew Inman, as well as completely new card types that reflect the Minions universe. Joeri says Exploding Minions has performed fantastically since being introduced in June.
