Heirloom: A Game about Tomatoes

Heirloom Overview

Master Chef Contents

Heirloom Add-Ons

Cookbook

Not a gamer and just want the cookbook? We’ve got you covered! Use this Secret Reward link to pledge for the cookbook on its own:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/aerobellumgames/heirloom-a-game-about-tomatoes?secret_reward_token=bdc1f390

We’re using a Secret Reward because Kickstarter only lets us order rewards by price, and we expect this option to appeal to a smaller group of backers.

Please check the shipping table for rates to your region (first column).

Garden Playmat

Deck of Heirloom Themed Playing Cards

Fridge Magnets

How to Play

Master Chef How to Play

You can also check out the rulebook here: 

Full Rulebook PDF

Solo Walkthru

Stretch Goals

(This art is only partially rendered, it's in progress though!

Our Prior Games

HYVE

HYVE was our first PNP game and we returned to it for our 8th Kickstarter in super-deluxe physical form with over 250 new pages of unique content.  The HYVE campaign is too immense to try and capture here, so check out the original campaign here:  

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/aerobellumgames/hyve-legacy-edition

You can still buy these items that were on the original campaign.  As a new publisher, getting into widespread retail is highly unlikely, so this may be your only chance to get these items! 

HYVE Compendium

HYVE Collector's Edition

The HYVE Collector’s Edition is only still available because mass production has not yet begun. Once this campaign ends, it will no longer be available!

Cat Nap - Founder's Edition

We are selling the last remaining Founder's Edition copies of Cat Nap that aren't available anywhere else.  Includes ALL Cat Nap content, plus a Cat Nap PNP Edition, as well as other special digital content for backers only!

Aerobellum Master Collection

Project Timeline

Print and Play Anthology

Jumping headlong into game publishing was a massive undertaking for us who had some prior design experience, but no publishing background. That’s why we started by making print-and-play games. You can get our entire PNP anthology of games for only $29 as an add-on to this campaign. A total of 568 pages of PNP content, not including translations! (Don’t worry! Much of that 568 pages is in the form of rulebooks, supplementals, and story content that you don’t necessarily need to print to enjoy.)

HYVE PNP

HYVE https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/aerobellumgames/hyve-a-colorful-beehive-simulator

The PNP phenomenon that started it all! Lead your colony from surviving to thriving in this roll-and-color beehive simulator. Build, expand, and manage your growing colony over dozens of individual scenarios. This 1st Edition of HYVE and the later physical games actually share no overlapping content, all pages are unique between 1st and 2nd Editions. 

METUS (1st Edition) PNP

METUS https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/aerobellumgames/metus/
A deep tactical game for two players inspired by classics like Chess and Go, but with a layer of bluffing and bluster.

All you need are two colors of pencil or pen and six pawns, coins, or other markers.
With dozens of unique Actions and multiple scoring systems, METUS offers a surprising amount of strategic depth from a very small set of components. It also includes a solo mode where you take on the role of the State, attempting to suppress a growing Insurrection.

Moonlight PNP

Moonlight https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/aerobellumgames/moonlight-1/
An epic solo comic-noir detective story built around an evolving narrative campaign. Across 8 distinct Episodes, the mystery becomes more complex, the story grows deeper, and the gameplay expands alongside it.

The campaign saves some of its biggest ideas for last, culminating in a final stretch that brings together the story, your earlier decisions, and everything the game has taught you along the way.

Moonlight took more than a year to complete, 100s of hours of design/development and playtesting work, with later Episodes containing more content on their own than many complete Print-and-Play games. It was designed to feel less like a collection of scenarios and more like playing through an interactive detective series.  Almost 2 years after the original campaign, Midnight City and the world of Moonlight is still very close to my heart.

Geomandering PNP

Geomandering https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/aerobellumgames/geomandering/

A unique area-majority dueling game about warring wizards using spells of immense power to divide the land for petty political gain.
We can confidently say it is the finest area-majority gerrymandering wizard game ever made—admittedly, a category in which Geomandering is the only contender!
Beyond the core game, Geomandering includes a large collection of alternate play modes, don’t have another wizard to play with? That’s ok, turn on solo mode (compatible with any map) where you must put down a full-blown Peasant Revolt!

METUS (2nd Edition) PNP

METUS: Second Edition https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/aerobellumgames/metus-2nd-edition

A return to the game that helped define our early PNP catalog, rebuilt from the ground up with a clean vector-based aesthetic and an enormous amount of new content.
The Second Edition expands METUS with extended solo campaigns, asymmetrical factions, and more than 20 times the map content of the original release.
It is a dramatically larger and more refined version of the game—and unlike the original edition, no AI-generated artwork was used in this iteration.

High Adventure: Treasure Hunt PNP

High Adventure: Treasure Hunt 

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/aerobellumgames/high-adventure-treasure-hunt
High Adventure: Treasure Hunt was in development for nearly two years. Every Mission uses a common adventure system built around exploration, pathfinding, leveling up, combat, searching, resource management, and a wide range of other actions. 100s of hours of work when into this single PNP title.

That core system gave us the freedom to create wildly different scenarios while keeping the game intuitive from one adventure to the next: One mission might have you using explosives to drain the lava from a volcanic caldera so you can reach an obsidian fortress hidden within. Another has you competing in a tribal dance challenge. Another sends your caravan across a parched desert while you search for your destination and try to avoid enormous sandworms.

The game is also packed with additional content like unique Famous Adventurers you can build a custom team with, as well as a persistent legacy system that straddles across all missions.
 

About Us

Hi, I’m Matthew Folger! After a 20-year career in tech—and a lifetime of creative work spanning music, activism, blogging, writing, and podcasting—I made the leap into board games full-time about two and a half years ago.

I started with print-and-play games as a way to learn crowdfunding, art direction, graphic design, and game development before moving into full physical production. Those earlier creative experiences ended up preparing me surprisingly well for the challenges of running a game company.

Today, I run Aerobellum Games while designing or co-designing all of our titles. We’ve got a packed slate of games planned for 2027 and beyond, and I’m incredibly excited for what’s next. =]

Graphic Design

Philipp Kehl is an industry veteran with a playful mind and a soft spot for vibrant worlds. But most importantly he identifies as a lifelong violin player, full-time nerd, character-design addict, lover of heavy guitar riffs, amateur foodie and unapologetic fan of penguins and dinosaurs.

Heirloom Trailer Direction and Production

David is the Founder and Lead Creative of Mesa Game Lab, and a board game Designer. Before making Mesa Game Lab a full time gig, he worked in the film and television industry since 2004 on both cartoon and live action visual effects including projects like Halo, Resident Evil, Wandavision, Watchmen, and What We Do In the Shadows.

David lives in Düsseldorf, Germany with his wife and two sons.

Rendering & 3D Modeling (Including Trailer)

Pixelandboard.com is ran by owner/operator Alexei Menardo.

I'm a board game enthusiast looking to bring value to community. 
I started off doing 3D renders for fun and I quickly found that there is a need for more affordable solutions for creating promotional material for board games. That's what I hope to provide.

Playtesting & Development

Aerobellum Games runs its own team of play testers and developers.  If you're an aspiring game designer and want to help playtest future Aerobellum titles reach out to me!  We may be able to teach each other a thing or two.  =)

As of this writing Aerobellum Design Labs Consists of: 

• Owen Wong
• Cory Graff
• Bridey Clevenger
• Ari D'Arconte
• Damien Le Prieur
• Dann Kriss
• Liam Burns
• Alex Greiner
• Joshua Setters

Art Direction: Ammon Anderson

Ammon Anderson is a lifelong creative. His background is in Fortune 500 corporate design and brand management. He is a game designer, graphic designer, Art director, illustrator, and public speaker.
He is the owner of Levity Games, and a game designer who has created Gnome Hollow (also Illustrator), Twinkle Twinkle, and Cats vs Cucumbers, T.A.C.O. and more.

He also was a Graphic Designer on our prior title: Cat Nap!

Business Development & Logistics

Dara Studios is a team of industry experts ran by Emma Goodie and Rich Gain.  They facilitate our logistics through a global partnerships with local distributors.  Meaning that we aren't managing all the complications of international logistics ourselves, leave that to the experts!  If you run a FLGS and would like to purchase through our distributors please reach out to the following based on your location: 

Asia/Pacific: VFI
USA: Diamond Comics & ACD
Australia/New Zealand: Let's Play Games
Canada: Asmodee Canada
UK/EU: Spiral Galaxy UK

Live Campaign Marketing

Pledge Manager

Prelaunch & Live Marketing

Prelaunch Club is the online support network created by Matt Olick. Matt Olick co-created three Top-200 Steam games of all time, launched eCommerce brands home to 10M social followers, and helped startups fundraise over $150M. Now, it’s his turn to give back and teach everything he knows for little to no cost on his website. 

https://prelaunch.marketing/

Prelaunch Club's Bustling Discord Server (if you're an aspiring creator looking to do a crowdfunding campaign do yourself a favor and join!)

https://discord.gg/99AfZKqM6G

Live Campaign Marketing (Reddit Ads)

Kickstarter Page Design

Florian Fiedler is a freelance tabletop designer and illustrator who greatly assisted with the graphics and layout for this campaign. He essentially lives in Figma, acting as an unofficial ambassador who firmly believes it is the greatest tool ever built. Beyond the canvas, he is a chess player, a strategy gamer, a gym regular, a foodie, and a dedicated fan of the all-black wardrobe.

Localization Partner

Serotonin Games helps tabletop publishers turn good games into real commercial opportunities.

We work across localization, distribution, retail outreach, crowdfunding support, convention representation and business development — where publishing, sales and industry relationships meet.

AI Stuff

No AI was, is, or will be used in Heirloom or any of the (non-PNP) products for sale on this campaign.

Some AI was used in the editing of some page elements of this campaign page. Figma (which we use for KS page asset creation, uses embedded AI tools for background removal that are FAR superior to Adobe Photoshop); AI is also useful for targeted color correction of specific 3D rendered assets provided by Alexei Menardo (I find this much easier to do this in AI toolsets than buy an Adobe "After Effects" license (and learn how to use it)); as well as some of the overlay effects used (for example the painterly effects used on actual photographs in the Giovanni bio section, which is again cheaper than learning a whole new stack of Adobe software).  Also, I'd rather give my money to literally any AI company than give it to Adobe, but that's just my personal preference.

The visual art budget for Heirloom well was over $30,000, paid to real illustrators, graphic designers, videographers, rendering specialists, Art Directors, KS page designers and more. Collectively Aerobellum Games has spent over $130,000 in support of real human artists in our less than 3 year existence, on past, present and future titles. I have 5 teams of visual artists working for me as of writing these words, consisting of 3 graphic designers and 6 illustrators building out our future catalog of 5+ unpublished titles for our 2027 pipeline and beyond. Aerobellum's total visual art budget paid to humans should easily exceed $200,000 by the end of 2027 at the rate we are moving.

Having personally used AI extensively on prior projects (our PNP games "Moonlight" and "High Adventure: Treasure Hunt") I’ve learned that AI isn’t really a shortcut to anything; as using it effectively is incredibly time-consuming. In my case, however, I found it extremely useful for learning much about art direction, graphic design, and overall aesthetics, albeit at an immense cost of my own time.

While everyone should rightfully be opposed to "AI slop", some people like myself are using these technologies in widely different capacities; and I can say that AI was incredibly helpful in the creation of our half of our PNP titles that had no possibility to exist otherwise.  While I wouldn't go as far to say that Aerobellum Games wouldn't exist without those early AI-assisted titles to help me learn the ropes, I think it also a stretch to claim that we would "for sure" exist without them.

If you're looking for a company that is looking to replace human artists with AI, you'll have to look elsewhere; as that doesn't describe Aerobellum Games at all. Aerobellum Games story is literally the opposite: use AI to learn, then use that knowledge to build a real, enduring company based on HUMAN creativity.

As part of this campaign, we are offering our prior PNP games some of which used AI generated art, specifically for “METUS (1st Edition)”, “Moonlight”, and our final PNP game “High Adventure: Treasure Hunt”.  While AI was used in those games, again they were immense design projects taking 100s of hours of design, literal years of game development, playtesting and storytelling work put into them and I am incredibly proud of the final products. Also, due to the amount of illustration work required, these games would have had no chance to exist without AI. As of now, these titles are available for sale no where else, so we added them to this campaign, as not offering them to willing buyers feels like a massive waste after all the work that went into them.

All artwork in Heirloom and (its add-ons) is 100% hand-illustrated by Giovanni Spadaro, with graphic design by Philip Kehl and the renders used on this page created by Alexei Menardo. We are extremely careful to ensure that not a single proverbial "drop" of AI-generated artwork makes its way into any of our physical products. It's ultimately pretty simple: I hire artists because they are talented and love to create art, not because they are "gifted" at prompting AI toolsets.

That said, building a Kickstarter page can require an enormous amount of time and resources. The HYVE campaign page (our prior campaign) alone represented well over 100 hours of my own time, let alone the contributions of five other people who assisted with JUST the KS campaign page. It may surprise you to learn that KS pages alone can often have budgets of $10,000 and can go much higher.  After working myself to the bone on the HYVE KS page, I changed my stance regarding AI use on KS pages, even on products that feature zero AI in the box. After all, 100 hours of my time spent on Kickstarter page design means 100 hours of me NOT designing new games, which frankly I'd much rather be doing! =]

I view the campaign page primarily as a marketing tool rather than part of the game itself, and in that context I am comfortable using AI-assisted tools where they help us create a stronger presentation more efficiently. Yet, the efficiency gained is much smaller than you might imagine if you've never personally done this type of work. 

My priority is to direct as much of our budget as possible toward making actual games, components, artwork, and production quality the best they can be, rather than spending disproportionately on what is ultimately advertising. It also allows us to reduce my reliance on expensive software subscriptions, and the sunk time of learning of specific (Adobe) tools that have no other effective application to my workload, and therefore to redirect those savings of time and money back into the products themselves.

Thank you for your careful understanding of this matter. We certainly live in interesting times.

--Matthew, Aerobellum Games

Just to be fully transparent, here are the few examples where I used some AI tools during the KS page construction: 

Example of AI use #1: 

Due to the virtual lighting placement in the rendering environment, the purple tomato on the far right card came out a little "washed" looking.  I used integrated tools in Figma to color correct the tomato, so it has the rich purples that you'd actually see in the game.  Most rendering lighting issues like these aren't fixed IN the render environment but with post-render touch ups like this.

Example of AI use #2: 

I used one of the photos of the restaurant's kitchen to and an AI tool-set to create a painterly overlay, and then adjusted the color settings considerably to tune out the "cold" blues and greys of the original photograph, as Heirloom's overall art style has a much more sunlit and warm tonality to it.  The painterly effect was AI, the "warming" of the color tones was just good old fashioned turning knobs on the color settings of the image (no AI).

These are the only areas in which AI was used on the KS page, other than the background removal tool in Figma which is used so often I couldn't tell you conclusively where it was and wasn't used on the KS page.