History
Watts, a geography teacher, originally developed the game as a teaching aid to help students become familiar with the geography of industrialized countries and to try to demonstrate how geography and competition had resulted in lines being developed in some places but not others. He had self-published the game, initially in kit form (hex sheets and colouring instructions) for many years, from at least the early 1970s, before it was released in a boxed set. Trading as "Rostherne Games", Watts sold individual maps, together with brief instructions and the special dice required. Many maps were available, based on Watts' own encyclopedic knowledge of railway history, and each set in a specific geographical area, such as England, Scotland, Leeds to Liverpool, or India. The maps were made of laminated paper, and the Rostherne Games edition of Railway Rivals was both addictive and very cheap. During the height of the UK postal Diplomacy hobby in the 1980s and 1990s, Railway Rivals (with slightly adapted rules to allow for simultaneous building) was probably the second most widely-played game after Diplomacy itself, with several zines (including Watts' own Rostherne Games Review) dedicated principally to Railway Rivals.
In the 1980s, the game was formally published first by Butehorn and then by Schmidt Spiele (from 1981), both in Germany, and won the Spiel des Jahres in 1984. But it was the mass-market Games Workshop edition that brought it to many people's attention. The GW game board was made of laminated card, with a map of Central England on one side and the Western USA on the other; pens, dice and small plastic trains were also included. The game has subsequently been republished under its German name, Dampfross, initially by Laurin (1990) and then by Queen Games (1995). In 1998 Watts sold the rights to all Rostherne Games to Theo Clarke.
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