Gee, I just like rolling up shit at random and reverse-engineering explanations for it later.

Quote from: Dwight

Quote from: Age of FableActually, I just realised your hypothetical situation isn't hypothetical, it did happen in some non-English speaking countries: in Germany, das Schwarze Auge (a bit like a combination of Basic D&D and Tunnels and Trolls), and in Sweden Draker och Demoner (RuneQuest with a fair bit of D&D).

Yeah, examples of D&D getting kicked to the curb. But I wonder if that wasn't language barriers that actually gave them the chance over D&D?

No. The German situation had almost control group-like qualities.

• Both D&D (Mentzer Red Box) and Das Schwarze Auge appeared simultaneously in very similar packages, with basic boxed sets, at roughly the same MSRP.
• Both were published by respected game publishers: D&D by a subsidiary of ASS, the (then) leading card game manufacturer; DSA by Schmidt Spiele, a second tier board game manufacturer (with "first tier" being Ravensburger, Milton Bradley, Parker).
• Both had a professional distribution network that got them into toy stores and department chains. (FSV even distributed the US hardcover books of AD&D to Karstadt, a chain comparable to Sears.)
• Both immediately followed with modules that became common "must-play" experiences in their respective communities (Keep on the Borderland vs. Das Wirtshaus zum Schwarzen Keiler).
• During their first year both games published an almost equal number of supplements; an expert set and modules.
• Both games were supported by their own magazines. D&D received his translation of Dragon ("Drache"), a magazine with a color cover, hosting rules variants, new monsters, classes, a module, and prizes to win. DSA got a shorter, black/white, newspaper-style publication called "Der Aventurische Bote".
• (And both were written by the same guy. D&D was translated by Uli Kiesow before he wrote and sold his own game to Schmidt. Before that he had translated and published T&T as Schwerter & Dämonen under his own imprint, FanPro...)

I'd say that D&D still had the better launch point because
a) there already was a community of (student) gamers that used the English version of (A)D&D
b) the graphic presentation of D&D was more shiny
c) first D&D products had a better "bang for the Deutschmark", word count-wise
d) German D&D appeared three months before DSA
But in the end, DSA had the better (if somewhat accidental) marketing. While D&D didn't prohibit fan-authored work (and there were a lot of fanzines devoted to D&D, like Fantasywelt and Pläi Beck) DSA somehow managed to encourage its fans to be more active, and drew them into the fold of the editorial team. Anyone dedicated enough had a real chance of contributing to the setting, Aventuria, and getting published.

The situation got worse for D&D when TSR US took the localization into their own hands, with disatrous consequences (around the same time the magazine Imagine got cancelled in England, leading to an exodus of writers to White Dwarf and GW). Their comedic translation of the D&D PHB and DMG was a reason for much amusement and outright hilarity, but also the final nail to the coffin of D&D in Germany.

D&D stumbled from publisher to publisher. After the end of the FSV phase AD&D ended up at Welt der Spiele (the biggest RPG distributor), with TSR UK still holding the reins of the translation and editorial work.

Many years later, in the latter half of the nineties DSA was struck by two catastrophes: the death of Uli Kiesow and the bancruptcy of Schmidt Spiele. Both happened in the midst of a Dragonlance-like plotted campaign arc that was meant to rewrite much of the setting, Aventuria. For about six months it was not known where the license would end up - and when. The liquidator finally sold the license to FanPro but DSA had lost its wide spread distribution.

Two years later WotC bought TSR and the cards got shuffled anew. WotC has had good business relations with their MTG distributor, Amigo Spiele. Amigo published AD&D 2nd Edition.
But 25 years of DSA had put their mark on the way RPGs had to look in Germany: boxed sets. Amigo mirrored that aproach and split the content of the hardbacks into stapled booklets and put a box around them. Thanks to Amigo's distribution network and recognition (MTG and Pokemon) D&D was able to attack DSA. Amigo also published D&D3. Around 3.5 they gave the license to Feder & Schwert. After FanPro's almost-bankruptcy last year Das Schwarze Auge is also with a new publisher. (The editorial crew is still the same.)

Today, D&D and DSA are back where they began - at eye level, sales and market penetration-wise. Both are at established mid-to-top tier RPG publishers. By the end of this year both will be into their fourth edition. And the coming of D&D4 could be the event that might tip the scales for the first time in German RPG history in D&D's favour.

[Edit] December 2008: The performance of D&D4 is very weak in Germany, so it doesn't look as if my prediction will come true. Feder & Schwert just lost the license and the future of D&D in Germany is once again in the air. [/Edit]

So, to summarize, D&D and DSA started out on even grounds (with D&D being slightly better positioned).
Despite the fact that, in the first year, DSA had the weaker rules and presentation, DSA won the struggle through a combination of luck (on the side of Schmidt) and bad business decisions (on the part of TSR).
And D&D is only back in the saddle thanks to several events that crippled DSA.

Something like this could have happened to AD&D in the States as well, at several Points of Departures. It is not some quality inherent in D&D's design that makes the game the market's leader.
If it were, D&D would have taken the German market back in 1984 in a fell swoop.

 * * *

And while I am at it, one interesting potential Point of Departure in German RPG history:
D&D and DSA were so successful in their first year that the German branch of Parker was interested in entering the market as well. There was a small, convention-like, gathering of the leading RPG publishers, designers, and dedicated fans in 1985 or 1986. During that event the chief editor of the first semi-professional RPG magazine in Germany disclosed that Parker had approached him to design a "role playing game for the whole family", and he looked for playtesters of a system that used "colour dice instead of pipped ones (or polyhedrons)".

I still :banghead: for not raising my hand back then!

Obviously, the game was never published, but I wonder what could have been...

QuoteYou were 3 yrs old then? I was 14(15) around the year you suggest. I remember what teenagers were playing and talking about.

 I was 6, and I didn't play D&D yet. I remember kindergartners playing Dukes of Hazzard in the playground. It's just not the same.