Exploding Kittens Claws Way To Top Spot In Apple's App Store In 24 Hours
Exploding Kittens, at one time the most monetarily funded project on Kickstarter and still the record holder for attracting the most backers, is now available to purchase as an app in Apple's App Store. It's proving just as popular in app form, having risen to the top spot after just one day, leapfrogging Minecraft: Pocket (No. 2) to get there.
From the humorously warped mind of Matthew Inman of the hugely popular The Oatmeal comic, he and co-creators Eland Lee (Xbox, ARGs) and Shane Small (Xbox, Marvel) conceived the card game, offering backers a regular deck and a Not Safe For Work (NSFW) edition. The object is to be the last person standing, which you accomplish by avoiding or defusing a limited number of Exploding Kitten cards that are shuffled into the deck. It's a simple premise with a bit of strategy and a lot of laughs.
The conversion to an iOS app was done by developer Substantial. It's a 2-5 player game synced to phones in the same room for local multiplayer action. It's not clear if a future update will add remote multiplayer to the mix, but for now, it's essentially a local replacement for the physical cards.
"Our app is one of the first games to use a combination of Wi-Fi and Bluetooth to communicate with players around you, so we don't have to rely on the Internet or Gamecenter to play," the Exploding Kittens team explans. "You just stand near your friends and connect. Since there aren't many of us out there doing this yet and the technology is super new, it's got some bugs and doesn't always work perfectly, but we're hoping with your help we can keep making the game better."
The app is $1.99 in the App Store and as a launch special, all in-app purchases are free for the next couple of days, those being a trio of card expansion packs. A version for Android is in the works.
From the humorously warped mind of Matthew Inman of the hugely popular The Oatmeal comic, he and co-creators Eland Lee (Xbox, ARGs) and Shane Small (Xbox, Marvel) conceived the card game, offering backers a regular deck and a Not Safe For Work (NSFW) edition. The object is to be the last person standing, which you accomplish by avoiding or defusing a limited number of Exploding Kitten cards that are shuffled into the deck. It's a simple premise with a bit of strategy and a lot of laughs.
The conversion to an iOS app was done by developer Substantial. It's a 2-5 player game synced to phones in the same room for local multiplayer action. It's not clear if a future update will add remote multiplayer to the mix, but for now, it's essentially a local replacement for the physical cards.
"Our app is one of the first games to use a combination of Wi-Fi and Bluetooth to communicate with players around you, so we don't have to rely on the Internet or Gamecenter to play," the Exploding Kittens team explans. "You just stand near your friends and connect. Since there aren't many of us out there doing this yet and the technology is super new, it's got some bugs and doesn't always work perfectly, but we're hoping with your help we can keep making the game better."
The app is $1.99 in the App Store and as a launch special, all in-app purchases are free for the next couple of days, those being a trio of card expansion packs. A version for Android is in the works.
