the ONLY THEN team

Illustrator

Jessica, Writer & Illustrator

Art and breathing are one and the same for Jessica. From replicating her favorite cartoon heroes and villains in crayon to cataloguing the natural world in charcoal, pen and ink, and watercolor, she was determined to become an illustrator throughout her childhood. She pursued an art education in New England, where she quickly fell in love with the stories behind the art. Writing and breathing, you see, are also one.

Her writing took her north to Alaska and south to New Mexico, where eventually she found her way back to illustration. For a few absurd moments, she wondered which path she was meant to be on: writer or artist. Those moments passed, and now she is publishing novels, illustrating games and books, and reveling in the joy of not having to choose between them at all.


Game Designer

Jamison, Writer & Game Designer

The rules for Jamison’s first board game were written on midline orange construction paper. His passion for playing and inventing games as a kid was boundless, and he nearly failed senior year calculus because he was more focused on coding a maze into his TI-85 than doing math. And then he grew up.

Obtaining degrees in literature and writing, he spent five years traveling the world, collecting folktales from south Asia and another five from the North American Arctic. Settling down and starting a family gave him time to reflect on what story should be told next. He decided to grow back down, learn how to code C#, and finally put those midline ideas into a game.


Storyboard Artist

Elke, Storyboard Artist

If she’s not reading a book at the dinner table, in her bed, or on the floor, and if she’s not writing her own book, Elke’s probably off chasing a moth or playing hide-and-go-seek with a spider or telling a deer about that time she climbed to the very top of the apple tree. With any time between, she does illustrations for Only Then Games. Her connection to nature has been inspiration for more than a few creative projects.


Playtester

River, Playtester

River never met a puzzle that he didn’t want to solve. Whether classic jigsaw or intricate maze or seemingly unreachable ledge in a Mario Brothers game, his dedication to this quest is endless. To Only Then, he brings this enthusiasm to designing levels for games both real and imagined, and testing the rules that make the strategy behind a puzzle so addicting.


Ronja, Director of Enthusiasm

Kidnapped from a farm in the San Juan Mountains before she got to know her family, Ronja spent her first few years struggling to adapt to domestic life. Her chaos was unbounded, until an encounter with a black bear cub (a story for another time) got her ruminating on the meaning of life. She now spends her days herding the deer and squirrel of northern New Mexico’s canyons, channeling that wildness into some order for (in her opinion) the good of the desert.