Overview
Tavern Studios is a small independent game studio behind Ale & Axes, a free fantasy role-playing game that runs in a web browser. Four people make up the whole team: three co-founders covering design, development, and game design, plus an artist1. The studio says it launched in 2021 and has worked on Ale & Axes since1.
Ale & Axes is built on Cardano, and the Cardano Foundation lists it in its app catalogue as a maintainer pick2. The studio presents Tavern Forge as its services arm, which other projects hire for build work3. The name Tavern Squad appears on its Fund 12 grant proposals4 and on its on-chain collectibles5.
Key Features
- One title, built over years. Tavern Studios launched in 2021 and has worked on Ale & Axes since1. A Fund 12 proposal filed under the name Tavern Squad said a Cardano browser beta had already been built4.
- A game that opens in a browser tab. Ale & Axes needs no download and no email address to start. Players send squads of three adventurers on raids and read the fight back afterwards as a turn-by-turn log6.
- Build work for other projects. Through Tavern Forge, the team builds custom minting pages, in-game reward mechanics, and non-custodial NFT staking that keeps collectibles usable across ecosystems, working alongside the minting service NMKR and Saturn.io3.
- A client delivery on the public record. NMKR credits Tavern Forge with building the Snekkies mint page and buyer journey on its own tools, covering wallet connection, eligibility checks, payment, and mint status7.
- An original score played by session musicians. The studio commissioned THNDR Studio for a Celtic-rooted soundtrack, with a Metropole Orchestra violinist on the tavern theme and a cellist on its dungeon counterpart8.
What to Expect
The Tavern Studios site is a three-page shopfront: a landing page, an about page, and a page for Tavern Forge. The login button hands you over to the game's own site, where Ale & Axes itself is hosted9.
Anyone sizing up the studio should start on the about page. It names all four people with their roles and states the studio's framing plainly, as a young indie team building role-playing games with Ale & Axes as its first game1.
Projects looking to hire the team get the fuller pitch. The Forge page sets out custom minting experiences, gamification drawn from building Ale & Axes, NFT staking that keeps collectibles usable across ecosystems, and general design and development work, with a direct contact address rather than a booking form3.
The playable game is on aleaxes.com, not on the studio site. Ale & Axes is an idle role-playing game where you queue raids that resolve while you are away, rank up crafting professions, and trade on a player-run auction house6. The team has also put its case to Project Catalyst, Cardano's community grant program, with two Fund 12 proposals. One sought a simpler onboarding path for mainstream gamers, the other reward mechanics tied to liquidity pools; the public record shows neither was funded410.
