About Us

Our Story

I love games. I always have. From catching my first Starly to hitting Masters in Legends of Runeterra consecutive seasons in a row, games have been one of my life’s great joys. But do you know what’s more fun than playing a game? Making one. Nothing pleases me more than when I can come up with an idea, a concept, a story and people gather around to enjoy it.

I started making games all the way back when I was a kid. My friend Lucas and I would sit around a Monopoly board with Pokémon cards and Legos, coming up with different wacky rules and mechanics to turn a deceptively simple commentary about capitalism into a vibrant experience filled with complex plot lines, boss battles, and toilets (you had to be there).

Those games eventually grew more complex, spanning hundreds of pages worth of documents and spreadsheets as I began to homebrew Dungeons & Dragons. That came alongside years of debates with friends over which stat in our latest game mattered the most, tier lists exploring the viabilities of characters, and long monologues detailing the rise and falls of our favorite franchises. We would argue over balance changes in our favorite games and I would boastfully claim that I could make something better.

Could I?

The truth is often sobering. I was not a game developer making revolutionary changes. I was a third-year college student, looking to graduate with a degree in Marketing with a minor in Economics. I had no skill for coding, nor was I an artist or musician. Instead, I was just another broke college student going down the path of business to make a living. Yet something inside me yearned for more. There was a voice that asked:

Is that it?

Every day I would work a 9-5, come home to attend lectures, then fulfill my responsibilities as a leader at my entrepreneurship club.

Is that it?

I began to ask that question out loud. It would sneak its way into conversations with friends and family, even strangers. They would give me puzzled looks and tell me that that’s simply the way things were. I was doing everything right, by the book, and I should be content.

Is that it?

It isn’t.

I may not be a coder or an artist or musician but I am someone who appreciates art, who loves music, and who has a strong grasp on what makes a game work well and what makes it fun. I am a storyteller, a designer, and a leader who has trained for years in learning how to bring different groups of people together. I can do it.

So there I am, vividly painting a picture to my friends about how awesome it would be if we made a game. I was met with obvious skepticism. However despite the initial “no’s” I received, each one of them had their own ambitions, talents, and dreams. As our conversations continued, my pitch slowly became less of an “I have a dream” but rather “let's dream together”. That was the birth of Half & Half Studios. A studio with zero budget, running on amateurs filled with passion and probably coffee.

That brings us to today. At Half & Half Studios, we’re just gamers making games for gamers, with love. With each and every day, we get stronger and better and one day we will leave our mark on the industry (and maybe make some money).

Thanks for reading,

David Dai

Founder & Game Director of Half & Half Studios