Dayton-area game maker featured on multiple national gift guides

Nov. 28—Dolphin Hat Games, a game maker based in Englewood, has been featured on multiple national gift guides this year for its flagship card game, Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza.

The game has been featured on gift guides from USA Today, BuzzFeed, CountryLiving, Detroit Free Press, Glitched and several others.

"This game has always had a lot of magic to it, a lot of viral growth. It's been a fun ride with this game," said company founder Dave Campbell. "This game is deceptive in the fact that it actually took a lot of work even though it is a very simple concept."

Campbell explained the game, launched in 2017, is based off of a game he loved playing as a kid called Egyptian Ratscrew. He took some of the leftover emojis from another game and came up with the concept of Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza.

When there is a match between a card and a spoken word, players will race against each other to slap their hand on the pile of cards. The last one to do so must take all of the cards. In the meantime, there will be a few special cards where players must complete actions before slapping the pile. The object of the game is to get rid of all of your cards first.

To make the game just a little challenging, Campbell said he worked really hard to get the color confusion right between the different cards. He explained you might want to slap the card because of the color, but the background colors and characters change.

"There's a lot of things you have to think about when you're creating a game, but the base point I usually start with when it comes to design is what resonates from the past that we can bring forward," Campbell said.

For example, he explained a modern game like Cards Against Humanity has fill-in-the-blank statements, similar to Mad Libs.

"Easy to learn and fun to play are the most important things to bring in a game for us," echoed Jenna Schroeder, the company's communications director.

She added that making sure people of all ages can play and have fun in a timely manner is equally important.

Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza is available in 50 countries using different languages and different cultural elements, Schroeder explained. The game is also the official game of the 2022 FIFA World Cup.

As the holiday season kicks into gear, Dolphin Hat Games has a Christmas version called Santa Cookie Elf Candy Snowman.

"It's a great stocking stuffer," Schroeder said. "It's a really nice gift to give because you know the person is going to have fun."

Dolphin Hat Games are available on the company's website, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Meijer, Walmart, Target, Kohl's and at local game stores.

"My hope is we continue to be good stewards of the Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza brand and bring it to more people and hopefully create more smiles that way, but then also create new games," Campbell said.

Two new games are expected to be released next year. There will be a game based off of the card game War which will use the gorilla from Taco Cat Goat Cheese Pizza and incorporate optical illusions. The other will involve rolling a dice and matching the number to the pepperonis on a pizza slice, Campbell explained.

For more information, visit www.dolphinhat.com or the company's TikTok, Facebook, Instagram or YouTube pages.