Greenstone Games was founded by Julian Stewart and Jarn La Rooij, both New Zealanders, in early 2010 for the original purpose of self-publishing a card game they had designed, called Seven. They began designing Seven in August 2009 and worked on the art, graphic design, and game play for over a year with help from dozens of friends who were willing to help with play testing. They then tested the game on complete strangers, who were all asked to play the game, and then fill out an anonymous survey online to give brutally honest feedback. In December 2011, Seven received the 'Major Fun Award', an award given by a group of game testers based in Indiana, USA, to games that are found to be 'major fun'. Both Julian and Jarn are from Christchurch, in the South Island of New Zealand. They are good mates and went to school together back in the old days. In 2012 Greenstone Games published PROVERBidioms, a puzzle game that is based on the humorous paintings by American artist Thomas Breitenbach. These paintings took around 5 years each to make, with the first one completed in 1975. Julian grew up with one of Breitenbach’s paintings hanging near the kitchen table, and whenever friends were visiting they would always gather around and stare at the unusal and captivating pictures inside the painting.