Kickoff
Working with Dan on Matchday Mayhem was the creative equivalent of stepping onto the pitch for a cup final: exciting, unpredictable, and full of the kind of energy that makes you want to sprint down the wing. He came to us armed with his original ideas and a handful of charming sketches, each one brimming with personality. It was immediately clear that this wasn’t just going to be another design job; this was going to be a proper creative match.
From the moment we saw the first doodled striker and scribbled stats, we knew this world had potential. Our job was to take Dan’s raw enthusiasm and translate it into fully developed characters, ready to sprint, tackle, and occasionally scowl their way across a tabletop. Bit by bit, his early concepts evolved into a squad of distinctive football heroes (and a few delightful troublemakers), each packed with their own quirks and backstories.
It Started With A Box
Designing the cards themselves was where the real mayhem began. We wanted every card to feel like a highlight moment in miniature, full of colour, attitude, and that over-the-top flair football fans love. Special action cards, cheeky fouls, unexpected twists… if it caused chaos on the pitch, we made sure it caused chaos in the deck too.
The Pièce de Résistance
The artwork became a playground for bold lines, dramatic poses, and the kind of expressions you only see when a referee makes a decision no one agrees with. We experimented with styles until we found that sweet spot between comic-book energy and football fever. Each player ended up looking ready for glory, or at least ready to dispute a VAR check.
Throughout the process, Dan was the perfect client-coach combo. He had a vision, but he also trusted us to experiment, explore, and occasionally sprint off in wild creative directions. That collaborative freedom helped the project develop its own identity: punchy, playful, and completely unapologetic about its love for the beautiful game.
The Morning After
By the end, Matchday Mayhem wasn’t just a card game, it was a fully realised world built from Dan’s initial spark and our design team’s love of turning ideas into something unforgettable. It’s bold, it’s silly, it’s strategic, and it absolutely lives up to its name. And honestly? We’d happily take on extra time just to make it all again.
Fully retouched photos in one day
# Interactions
Cheese triangles eaten in one day!
