Aethermon Studios

Aethermon Studios is an independent game studio created to bring to life the World of Aethermon.

Founded in Australia in 2020 at the start of the global pandemic, founder Chris and co-creator Adrienne started working on a tabletop game concept called Aethermon. Chris was the lead game designer: inspired by old-school JRPG video games, he wanted to distill the essence of these great pixellated hero adventures into a tabletop medium. Unable to resist the scent of a good hero story, Adrienne joined in, initially expanding the characters behind the gameplay and crafting additional lore.

By 2021 they had a working prototype, an ambition to take it to a convention … and a world still in the height of lockdowns. Character artist Fabio had lent his considerable artistic talents to bringing by then more than 45 creatures to 2-dimensional life. Was it all to be for nought?!

Not to worry – by mid-2022, conventions were opening back up, and Aethermon Studios was honoured to be one of only four winners of the PAX Aus 2022 Tabletop Rising competition – bringing with it a table and tickets to PAX Aus!

Thus in October of 2022, Aethermon Studios had its first major public introduction – but not for the original game concept, renamed Aethermon: Adventure. It was too ambitious an opening bid from a never-heard-of-’em start-up company.

Instead, Chris and Adrienne introduced Aethermon: Ascent (then named Aethermon: Tower of Darkness) – a 2-5 player roguelike tabletop game featuring 8 playable Aethermon creatures. Intended as a smaller game than Aethermon: Adventure, and thus a good introduction to the world and characters, it was a hit with convention attendees – but it also quickly bloated into something substantial, daring, and frankly huge. It wasn’t ready for publication. And despite nearly three years of working, building, and learning, Chris and Adrienne had realised that they too weren’t ready. They needed a history.

In 2023, Aethermon Studios returned to an idea Chris had toyed with two years earlier – an open-information strategy card game featuring all the Aethermon characters. This was it – small enough to be a manageable first project, with the same manufacturing components as future games, this was the vanguard product Aethermon Studios needed before launching their flagship. Background artist Miguel lent his incredible skills to the project and illustrated a gorgeous forest background for the game’s box art, as well as illustrating the playmat. It only needed a few more months of painstaking iterations and it was ready – the competitive/co-operative card game, Aethermon: Collect!

Aethermon Studios planned their crowdfunding campaign to launch in August 2023 and Aethermon: Collect had a small but successful campaign! It was funded, manufactured, and very soon shipped. And just two months later, in October 2023, we were honoured when Aethermon: Collect was awarded the SXSW Sydney 2023 Best Tabletop Game!

In 2024 Aethermon Studios is excited to return our focus to our earlier designs, with work progressing on both Aethermon: Ascent and Aethermon: Adventure. Both games have some commonalities, including a Battle and Progression System designed to function like a streamlined JRPG experience. At the beginning of your game, you choose your Aethermon companion, and this one creature stays with you for the entire game as you quest, battle, level up, and eventually evolve.

For more information about any of the Aethermon games, please click the ‘games’ tab above and select from the menu.

To read The Adventurers Club short story, click the ‘World of Aethermon’ tab above and select from the menu.

If you’re more interested to discover the rest of the World of Aethermon – why not look around? Right now we have short stories, quizzes, and themed merchandise, with more to come in the future!

 

If you’d like to get in touch with us, you can find us on the following social media:

 

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Stay awesome, AetherRen!