TSR Powers Up

In the wake of the crusade against RPGs brought on by Pat Puller and BADD, the RPG industry was recovering, but definitely not down for the count. The adversity that the gaming community had faced brought players closer together, and the publicity resulting from the events surrounding the alleged "D&D Suicides" brought the game into the public eye.

While still under pressure from the non-gaming community, role-playing clubs and conventions became more popular for those who shared the hobby. According to this article , Frank Metzer of TSR created the gaming society RPGA in 1980.
The Role Playing Games Association (RPGA) promoted quality group role-playing, using (of course) TSR's line of RPG products. Events featured Advanced D&D (AD&D), espionage-themed RPG Top Secret, and sci-fi RPG Gamma World. By the late 1980s, the RPGA used RPGs by other publishers, but the RPGA was one way that TSR ensured its success in the RPG market.

D&D and AD&D were still popular, but TSR wanted to make sure that the company and its products remained ahead of the competition. The designers of AD&D soon realized that they were creating the same worlds over and over again. If this were to keep happening, other RPGs such as FASA's 1982 Star Trek RPG would outsell TSR's products.

This did not happen, as Astinus mentions in RPG History Part 4. Instead TSR decided to design new worlds and release novels based on the worlds at the same time new game supplements would hit stores. TSR used staff writers Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, whose names are now well known in the fantasy genre, to breathe more life into the worlds of AD&D. A series called The DragonLance Chronicles resulted, and gained D&D massive popularity. Shortly after the series's 1984 release, it became the first fantasy series to make the New York Times bestseller list, and sold over three million copies worldwide since release.

Twelve D&D campaigns were written based on the novels. By the 1989, TSR had broken not only the industry's records but its own in sales of books and game supplements--twice!

Now that TSR is doing very well again, next time RPGs in other genres will be the topic of discussion.

Role-Playing's "Golden Age", Part 2: Culture, Conventions, and Criticism

While the RPG industry was flourishing commercially, role-playing as a type of gaming sub-culture was emerging along with it. In the same vein as wargames and science fiction, role-playing had found its niche in society, however small. Amateur and professional magazines were abundant, and a gaming mindset was created. According to the article "History of Role-Playing Part III", slang, gaming jargon, and in-jokes became common, since, like the gaming sessions themselves, the hobby of role-playing produced a strong sense of cameraderie within it and a need to isolate those outside of it.

Conventions were set up so gamers could communicate and collaborate. The first GenCon, a gaming enthusiast's convention, was held in 1978. The information for this year's GenCon 2010 is available, and it looks to be an exciting event! (I'm almost considering going, myself...) At conventions, role-playing gamers learned that they were not alone in their interests, and experienced an environment where they could feel confident and assured about their hobby. Publishing companies grew larger because their audiences had grown as well.

With role-playing at a cult status, the hobby had stability, which allowed writers and designers of RPGs to explore alternate venues of game design. Fantasy had been more or less exhausted, and science fiction was still in the works. Superhero games were published--Superhero 44 and Villains & Vigilantes. Crime RPGs got their start with Gangster!, a game based on movies like Scarface and Bonnie and Clyde.

Dungeons & Dragons was still popular, and the Advanced version of the game now came in three volumes: the Player's Guide, which held the class, racial features, and other information for players to create characters; the Dungeon Master's (DM's) Guide, which was helped someone create game worlds and rules to host a game for their friends; and finally the Monster Manual, the book full of big fantasy beasts and creatures for the characters to encounter and engage in battles with. D&D still does things this way today, but there will be a post on modern RPGs sometime in the future.

With the history of RPGs, just as with all histories throughout time, good things must come to an end. "History of Role Playing Part IV" discusses how, in the case of RPG history, the "Golden Age" was interrupted by tragedy. In August 1979 at Michigan State University, student James Dallas Egbert III (aka Dallas Egbert) ran away from the school intent on killing himself. He left a convoluted note that mentioned steam vents under the university and D&D, which he played avidly. Dallas did not kill himself at this time, and was found by a private detective.

During the case investigation, there was a terrible mistake. Irresponsible journalism as well as confusion by authorities spread a false story that D&D was responsible for Dallas's disappearance. Dallas commited suicide the next year, and gave birth to the story of the first "D&D" suicide, although it was known that he was under pressure as a child prodigy (he was enrolled in college at the age of 16), an alleged drug addict, and mentally unstable.

Although facts were few and mundane, the story of Dallas Egbert quickly exploded into myth, and D&D became a media scapegoat, being presented as a dangerous, cult-like activity that threatened children. After another suicide blamed on D&D, Pat Pulling, the mother of the victim, created the society BADD (Bothered About Dungeons and Dragons). Pulling brought a propaganda war against RPGs, including distribution of flyers and pamphlets, appearances on radio and TV talk shows, and live protests.
In 1984, Darren Molitor was on tirial for the muder of a girl which occurred while he was acting out a Halloween prank. Pulling, along with BADD, was able to convince him that D&D was controlling his actions, and that he was under the game's occult influences at the time of the event.

BADD may have fought dirty, but the RPG industry and its fans and followers fought back. Eventually the "Golden Age" continued.

The "Golden Age" of RPGs--Science Fiction Games

I know it's been a while since I've blogged about my research topic, or anything else really. Rather than waste time with excuses, I'll just jump right into the information.

I left off last time describing and discussing some of the RPG games that were created to challenge Dungeons & Dragons in the commercial arena. Now it's time to look at how well RPGs caught on and where the genre went next.

By the late 1970s, RPGs were established as a new and creative type of game that could be played over and over in different scenarios with different characters playing. According to Astinus's "The History of Role-Playing Part III", role-playing was a genre of gaming "...around which could be built literature, and convention, even a whole sub-culture. It had the potential to be very big, but at that time, it still had some way to go before it got there".

Fantasy RPGs such as D&D, Tunnels & Trolls, and Chivalry & Sorcery were making money and gaining popularity. Science fiction literature and subcutlure was the new craze in the U.S. so naturally it followed that sci-fi RPGs would be created next. StarFaring, by St. Andre press (the publishers of Tunnels and Trolls)was one of the first science fiction RPGs out in 1976. The game had a very small run, as well as the obscure Metamorphosis Alpha from TSR (D&D's publisher) and a few other games.

The most successful of early science fiction RPGs was Traveller by Mark Miller from Game Designers Workshop in 1977. The game was ground-breaking because it presented new ideas and was well designed. Up until that point, sci-fi RPGs had focused on the skill system, which is highly important, but had neglected to flesh out the design of the game. Besides creating a good skill system that was influential to other games later down the road, Miller also rejected a class or occupation requirement for player characters. Players only had to roll dice to find out what skills their character learned during their life.

The setting of the game was boundless. The rules of the game allowed for the creations of solar systems, planets, and countires. The books provided simple and easy to follow tables for generation of a random planet with factors such as size, temperature, government system, and religion. There were also tips for creating richly detailed cities and worlds. Miller provided his own game setting of a powerful yet decentralized empire instead of stealing from popular sci-fi movies and TV shows of the time. If players didn't like Miller's setting, they could easily change it. Part of the appeal of Traveller was the game's incredible flexibility.

Another of the major reasons that Traveller became so successful was that it was released close to the same time as the Star Wars movie. Now Star Wars fans could act out the adventures they had seen at the movie theater with their friends and "be" their favorite Star Wars character.

That wraps it up for now with science fiction games. In the next research post I'll be discussing the role-playing subculture.