Santa Dash: A Festive Adventure!

So here we go, our festive endeavour for 2025. This year we wanted to do something special, something that felt like a gift rather than a project, so the team gathered their creativity and built our very first Yopla game.

You can try it out here 👉 Santa Dash

Below is the story of how it came to be. Three days of focused coding, followed by a mix of evenings and weekends spent jamming, sketching, play testing and generally having a great time bringing this little world to life. We hope you enjoy it as much as we have.

Starting with the brief

We kept things simple from the start. We did not want this to become a time sink for us or for anyone who played it. The goal was clear gameplay, immediate fun and a sense of light competition. Something you could open, enjoy and return to without a second thought.

We focused first on the experience. The player should jump straight in, enter their name, pick a difficulty and go for it. No fuss, no overthinking, just movement, colour and a steady rise in challenge.

Building in competition

The global leaderboard came early. It made sense and it encouraged people to try again. Then we realised something important. People love competing with the people they know. Friends, colleagues, families, entire classrooms. During testing our children created their own school competitions. Some of those boards are still running with wild high scores that none of us can beat. That energy shaped the group mode that now sits inside the game.

Crafting the engine and play style

With the vision in place we moved into the build. The engine came first, then the flow of movement, then the timing of obstacles and rewards. Testing nudged us forward every step of the way. One theme stood out. It had to work smoothly on mobile. It does, although it offers a tougher challenge on a small screen which makes every close call feel more dramatic.

Another surprise was difficulty. Our Pro mode simply was not enough. Testers wanted something sharper and slightly chaotic. That is where the naughty elves arrived, gleefully throwing baubles into Santa’s path. They transformed the pace of the game and gave players a genuine reason to shout at their screens.

Bringing in the sound

The final ingredient was music. We wanted something festive but not predictable. Our resident musicians teamed up with an AI studio and shaped a soundtrack that feels warm, cheerful and unmistakably ours. It adds more personality than we expected.

A small project with a lot of heart

There is much more to share, but the best way to understand the joy behind this project is simply to play it. Santa Dash began as a small idea and became a reminder of what a group of tech minded people can create when they follow their curiosity.

Play it here at https://yopla-santadash.com/ and see how long you can keep Santa moving. We will keep an eye out for you on the leaderboard.

If you ever want something similar or just fancy chatting to the sort of people who make these things happen for fun, we are always here.