Content uploaded by Juraj Kovalčík
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Juraj Kovalčík on Sep 15, 2022
Content may be subject to copyright.
102 Game Studies102 Game Studies
Acta Ludolog ica 2022, Vol. 5, No. 1
Pen & Paper & Xerox:
Early History of Tabletop
RPGs in Czechoslovakia
Michal Kabát, Juraj Kovalčík,
Alexandra Kukumbergová, Radek Richtr
Mgr. Michal Kabát, PhD.
University of Ss. Cyril and Methodius in Trnava
Faculty of Mass Media Communication
Námestie J. Herdu 2
917 01 Trnava
SLOVAK REPUBLIC
michal.kabat@ucm.sk
Michal Kabát studied media communication and now is an assistant professor at the
Depar tment of Digital Gam es of the Faculty of Mass Me dia Communicatio n, University
of Ss. Cyril and Methodius in Trnava, Slovakia. His academic interests are particularly
focused on mapping the history of local gaming experience in post-socialist countries
and the current development of virtual worlds. He is involved in game jams, eSport
and video-streaming activities at the university.
Mgr. Juraj Kovalčík, PhD.
University of Ss. Cyril and Methodius in Trnava
Faculty of Mass Media Communication
Námestie J. Herdu 2
917 01 Trnava
SLOVAK REPUBLIC
juraj.kovalcik@ucm.sk
Juraj Kovalčík is an assistant professor at the Department of Digital Games of the Faculty
of Mass Media Communication, University of Ss. Cyril and Methodius in Trnava, Slovakia.
His research f ocuses on the histor y of games and gamin g in Slovakia, game nar ratives and
aesthetics, and relations between digital games and other audio-visual media.
102 Game Studies
ACTA LUDOLOGICA
Acta Ludolog ica 2022, Vol. 5, No. 1
Mgr. Alexandra Kukumbergová
University of Ss. Cyril and Methodius in Trnava
Faculty of Mass Media Communication
Námestie J. Herdu 2
917 01 Trnava
SLOVAK REPUBLIC
kukumbergova1@ucm.sk
Alexandra Kukumbergová is a PhD candidate at the Department of Digital Games of
the Faculty of Mass Media Communication, University of Ss. Cyril and Methodius in
Trnava, Slovakia. Her academic interests include ethics and politics of digital games
and gaming history. She is currently working on her dissertation thesis focused on
gamication.
Ing. Radek Richtr, PhD.
Czech Technical University in Prague
Faculty of Information Technology
Thákurova 9
160 00 Prague 6
CZECH REPUBLIC
richtrad@t.cvut.cz
Radek Richtr is currently an as sistant professor at Faculty of Inform ation Te chnology,
Czech Technical University in Prague. He received his Ph.D.’s degree in Computer
Graphics from the Faculty of Information Technology, Czech Technical University in
Prague. Currently, he also works as a postdoc at the Institute of Information Theory
and Automati on, Czech Academy of Scien ces, department of pattern recognitio n. His
areas of interest cover dynamic texture modelling, pattern recognition, game design,
and computational geometry.
ACTA LUDOLOGICA
104 Game Studies
ABSTRACT:
The study presents preliminary research focused on the history of tabletop role-playing
games (RPGs) in the former Czechoslovakia, especially Dungeons & Dragons (1974) and its
local clone Dračí doupě (transl. Dragon’s Lair, 1990). Based on theoretical literature, period
sources and semi-structured interviews with rst-generation players, it gives an overview of
the rst contacts with RPG in the specic post-communist cultural and economic context,
focusing on the distribution and reception of Dragon’s Lair, mainly in the Slovak part of the
former common state. As a partial outcome of an ongoing research into the local gaming
experience, the focus is not on the game itself or its commercial success, but rather on its
players, their characteristics and initial experiences with tabletop RPGs in the early 1990s.
KEY WORDS:
Dragon’s Lair, Dungeons & Dragons, fantasy, participatory culture, post-communist
transformation, tabletop role-playing games.
Introduction
In this study, we deal with tabletop role-playing games (RPGs) and their early players
in former Czechoslovakia. We focus on two specic titles, namely Dungeons and Dragons
(or Advanced Dungeons and Dragons, further referred to as D&D or AD&D) and its Czech
variant or clone Dračí doupě (transl. Dragon’s Lair).1 Tabletop RPGs, as we understand
them today, did not exist before 1974. Their direct predecessors were strategy wargames.2
Tabletop RPGs possess two features that make them very dierent: elements of children’s
make-believe games (the role-playing or simulation element) and omniscient referees, the
dungeon master (or game master, further referred to as DM or GM) who is not neutral un-
like in traditional wargaming.3
Development of the rst proper RPG games is attributed to D. Wesely (the rst to
assign players single heroes instead of letting them command armies in 1967), D. Arneson
(who was the rst to put fantasy and medieval elements into traditional tabletop war-
games), and G. Gygax (who drafted the rules for the so-called Fantasy Game, where play-
ers control heroes and roll dice to ght monsters, later transformed into Dungeons and
Dr agon s).4 All three stayed in this eld; D. Arneson was a game developer his whole life,
G. Gygax continued to develop more game systems and D. Wesely went on to design board
games and digital games. Even L. Schick, who was among the rst to research and docu-
ment the histor y of tabletop RPGs in 1991, stayed in the industry, known mostly as the lead
content designer for The Elder Scrolls Online5.
1 Remark by the authors: The original Czech title is Dračí doupě, but to make English expression easier,
further in the study we will use its literal translation, Dragon’s Lair.
2 NIKOLA IDOU, D.: The Wargame L egacy: How Wargam es Shaped the Role playing Exper ience from Tabletop
to Digital Games. In HAMMON D, P., PÖTZSCH, H. (eds.): War Games: M emory, Militarism and the Subject of
Play. London, New York, NY : Bloomsbury Academic, 2019, p. 180-183.
3 PETERSON, J.: The Elusive Shift: How Role-Playing Games Forged Their Identity. London, Cambridge, MA :
The MIT Press, 2020, p. 4-12.
4 SCHICK, L.: Heroic Worlds: A History and Guide to Role-playing Games. Bualo, NY : Prometheus Books,
1991, p. 17-20.; EWALT, D. M.: Of Dice and Men: The Story of Dungeons & Dragons and The People Who Play
It. New York, NY : Simon & Schuster, 2013, p. 65-70.
5 ZENI MAX ONLINE ST UDIOS: The Elder Sc rolls Online. [digital g ame]. Rockville, MD : B ethesda Soft works, 2014.
ACTA LUDOLOGICA
The process of bringing Dragon’s Lair to market is a story in which we nd several
elements typical of the atmosphere of the turn of 1980s and 1990s in the countries of
the Eastern bloc; from the initial unavailability of Western products leading to forced in-
genuity to the ‘wild’ commercialization in the form of semi-fraudulent systems, and later,
market standardization.6 With Dragon’s Lair and RPGs in general, commercial sales are
closely tied to community building; the two cannot be separated, as in this case, the play-
ers are not only consumers of the product but also its co-creators (as applies to this day).
From the point of view of game studies, we see pen & paper games as part of the overall
picture of playing games in the region of the former Czechoslovakia; we call this a ‘local gam-
ing experience’ and we are particularly interested in their distribution, adoption, reception,
and user participation. Our exploratory study aims to outline the early history of tabletop
role-playing games in the former Czechoslovakia (highlighting its Slovak part) in the years
immediately before and after the fall of the communist regime in 1989. We also try to uncover
certain qualitative aspects of the rst tabletop RPGs in our region. To this purpose, we have
combined research of secondary literature with primary sources in two forms: contempo-
rary rulebooks, magazines and other print media, and interviews with local participants who
we have addressed through various RPG internet communities. Interviewees were selected
based on their rst contact with RPGs in the late 1980s or early 1990s. We have conducted 11
semi-structured interviews (9 as internet video conferences, two as phone calls).7
In this text, we consider the terms pen & paper RPG and tabletop RPG interchange-
able, as the literature hardly distinguishes between them (see for example their use by
W. J. White and collective).8 As the survey shows, Czechoslovak pioneers were often short of
other props (maps, gures and sometimes dice), limiting their gameplay only to pen and pa-
per. Western games and their rulebooks were routinely distributed not by purchasing large-
ly unavailable legal copies but by photocopying originals and spreading those illicit copies
within networks of informal distribution. Both Czech and Slovak languages adopted (as did
English) the term ‘xerox’ to denote photocopying regardless of the brand name of the copier.
Aspects Forming Tabletop RPG
When dening role-playing games, the problem is that some authors either do not
consider them as proper games at all or see them as borderline cases.9 The determining
factor is not their analogue medium, but that human game masters inuence the rules.
Rules, of course, also determine the rules – in the case of GM, we are talking about allow-
ing options rather than limiting them. The denition can be also based on the emphasis
on a specic part of the game; as a guide, we use R. Edwards’ GNS model, which divides
the approach of RPG players into three categories: gamist, narrativist (later replaced
by dramatist) and simulationist (with possible slight overlaps).10 The initial model of GNS
division focused on the player’s motivation; in a looser understanding, we can also apply
6 See also: BUČEK, S.: Prvé herné komerčné subjekty na Slovensku. In JURIŠOVÁ, V., KLEMENTIS, M.,
RADOŠINSKÁ, J. (eds.): Marketing Identity 2016: Značky, ktoré milujeme. Trnava : FMK UCM in Trnava,
2016, p. 194-208.
7 Rem ark by the authors: T he names and oth er personal dat a of the interviewe es stated in the st udy are used
with their informed consent. The full tex t of the interviews has not been published.
8 WHITE, W. J. et a l.: Ta bletop Role-Playi ng Games. In ZAGA L, J. P. , DETERDING, S. (eds .): Role-Playing Game
Studies. New York, NY : Routledge, 2018, p. 64.
9 ZAGAL, J. P., DETERDING, S.: Denitions of “Role-Playing Games”. In ZAGAL, J. P., DETERDING, S. (eds.):
Role-Playing Game Studies. New York, NY : Routledge, 2018, p. 20.
10 EDWARDS, R.: System Does Matter. Released on 28th Januar y 2004. [online]. [2022-04-15]. Available at:
<http://www.indie-rpgs.com/_articles/system_does_matter.html>.
106 Game Studies
it to the style of the game, the game system or its denitions. For example, D. MacKay de-
nes an RPG as “an episodic and participatory stor y-creation system that includes a set of
quantied rules that assist a group of players and a gamemaster in determining how their
ctional characters’ spontaneous interactions are resolved”.11
J. G. Cover also emphasizes the narrative side of the tabletop RPG, dening it as “a
type of game/game system that involves collaboration between a small group of play-
ers and a gamemaster through face-to-face social activity with the purpose of creating
a narrative experience”.12 In addition to theorists, some game developers also favour the
narrative principle. B. King emphasizes the narrative that distinguishes D&D from board
games: “It was the rst really interactive game. If you play board games there is always an
objective or goal. D&D is the opposite. It’s about sitting down and telling stories with your
friends”.13 Simulationist role-play emphasizes exploration (with exploration being at least
partially present in two others) – according to R. Edwards, simulationist play varies as the
object of exploration varies.14 The simulationist perspective, which carries elements of
R. Caillois’ mimicry, is employed more when we view tabletop RPGs as simulation games,
which can be very appealing to some gamers, or when we attribute educational potential
to them (as realism or plausibility is a signicant part of this kind of role-play).15
The gamist approach focuses on winning and its means: levelling, mechanics, chal-
lenges. We may consider this category as a kind of starting point of the game: “Initially,
Dungeons & Dragons was largely gamist, doing little to encourage in-depth role-playing or
any form of storytelling”.16 To determine whether the initial campaigns of tabletop RPGs in
our region were predominantly gamist, as in the case of the Polish Kryształy Czasu (transl.
Crystals of Time, 1998), will require further research.17 Interviews we conducted indicate
that the approaches varied greatly depending on the game and especially on the DM.
Dungeons & Dragons behind
the Iron Curtain
Reports of anyone playing tabletop RPGs in Czechoslovakia before 1989 are rare.
Statistically, the few individuals who did play are not relevant, but these isolated cases at
least somewhat alleviate the considerable delay in the population’s contact with games
that had existed in the West for more than decade.
It appears tha t the rst mention of D&D in commu nist Czechoslovakia was a sensation-
alist article in the magazine 100+1 zahraniční zajímavost (transl. 100 + 1 Foreign Curiosity)
in July 1986. This report – purportedly lifted from the Italian magazine Epoca (6 years after
11 Ma cKAY, D. : The Fantasy Role-Playing Game: A New Performing Art. Jeerson, NC : McFarland & Company,
Inc., 2001, p. 4-5.
12 COVER, J. G.: The Creation of Narrative in Tabletop Role-Playing Games. London, Jeer son, NC : McFarland
& Company, Inc., 2010, p. 168 .
13 WATERS, D.: What happened to Dungeons and Dragons?. Released on 26th April 2004. [online]. [2022-05-
04]. Available at: <http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/3655627.stm>.
14 EDWARDS, R.: Simulationism: The Right to Dream. Released on 29th January 2003. [online]. [2022-04-15].
Available at: <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/articles/15/>.
15 KIM, J. H.: Threefold Simulationism Explained. Released on 25th January 2004. [online]. [2022-05-04].
Available at: <https://ww w.darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/theory/threefold/simulationism.html>.; WHITE, W. J.:
The Right to Dream of the Middle Ages: Simulating the Medieval in Tabletop RPGs. In KLINE, D. T. (ed.):
Digital Gaming Re-ima gines the Middle Age. New York, NY : Routledge, 2018, p. 18.
16 TRESCA, M. J.: The Evolution of Fantasy Role-Playing Games. Jeerson, NC : McFarland & Company, Inc.,
2011, p. 67.
17 MOCHOCKI, M., MOCHOCKA, A .: Magia i Miecz Magazine: The Evolution of Tabletop RPG in Poland and its
Anglo-Saxon Context. In Homo Ludens, 2016, Vol. 1, No. 9, p 170-171.
ACTA LUDOLOGICA
its original publication in 1979) – became a rather curious instigator of the development
of tabletop RPGs in Czechoslovakia. Titled “Číhá v dračím doupěti” (transl. Lurks in the
Dragon’s Lair) it discusses D&D as a dangerous mania responsible for the deaths of about
fty young Americans.18 When M. Klíma, aged 17 at the time, read it, he was left fascinated
and curious. Having the opportunity to travel with his parents to Bristol, England, where his
father lectured at university, M. Klíma purchased a D&D copy at the Games Workshop store,
brought the game to Prague, and began playing it there with friends.19 D&D (similar to other
Western titles) was not available on the market in communist Czechoslovakia , but a few
more copies may have been brought by ‘shopping tourists’ such as M. Klíma, and then circu-
lated similarly to sci- and fantasy literature or digital games from the West, only on a much
smaller scale. The language barrier (the overwhelming majority of the population did not
speak English) further hindered reception of Western media. As J. Švelch details, Czecho-
slovak gamers often acquired cracked and otherwise modied Western digital games with-
out original packaging or manuals, leading to common misunderstandings.20
Our research can account for two more parties playing D&D in Czechoslovakia before
the Velvet Revolution. While M. Klíma brought his copy from the United Kingdom, broth-
ers D. Lipšic and E. Lipšic carried their game all the way from Kuwait where their father
worked as a doctor during the years 1983-1986. Upon their return to Bratislava, they played
few sessions with their high school mates.21 At some time in 1987, another group of friends
xeroxed their rulebook (Picture 1). D. Šmihula and P. Čejka attended the same gymnasium
as the Lipšic brothers. M. Sústrik usually acted as DM and the fourth stable member was
D. Šmihula’s younger brother Vladislav. This core team played regularly throughout 1987-
1988. Curiously, Prague and Bratislava cells played dierent versions of D&D. M. Klíma
purchased the ‘red box’ Basic Set (1983 revision of the original game). The Lipšic brothers
owned the 1979 edition of Advanced D&D. In the early 1990s, when V. Šmihula got to play
M. Klíma’s Dragon’s Lair – which was largely a simplication of the basic D&D – he recalls it
was “a bit of a disappointment” and soon went back to playing his copy of AD&D.22
Picture 1: Hardcover binding containing the photo-copies of the AD&D handbook and add-ons. Collection of Vladislav Šmihula
Source: own processing
18 AURITI, S.: Číhá v dračím doupěti. In 100+1 zahraničná zajímavost, 1986, Vol. 23, No. 14, p. 10.
19 KLÍMA, M.: Hry nejen na hrdiny. In 518, V. (ed.): Kmeny 90: městské subkultury a nezávislé společenské
proudy v letech 1989-2000. Prague : BiggBoss, 2016, p. 645.
20 ŠVELCH, J.: Gaming the Iron Curtain. How Teenagers and Amateurs in Communist Czechoslovakia Claimed
the Medium of Computer Games. London, Cambridge, MA : The MIT Press, 2018, p. 143-144.
21 LIPŠIC, E.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 27th April 2022. 2022.
22 ŠMIHULA, V.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 19th April 2022. 2022.
108 Game Studies
If computer clubs provided a platform for distributing unauthorized copies of digital
games in the 1980s, sci-/fantasy clubs did the same for literature.23 Enthusiasts were not
concerned with copyright or licensing agreements; after all, it was a matter of disseminat-
ing (xeroxed) copies of scarce items, especially within clubs. After 1989, these clubs also
served as ‘recruitment centres’ for RPGs.
Dragon’s Lair, Its Adoption,
Players, and Reception
Amidst the transformation towards a liberal market economy M. Klíma rejected sam-
izdat as a suitable method for spreading the translated D&D. He decided to apply formally
to TSR (the original publisher of D&D) for a license, but the company never responded.
With the opening of borders and the market, M. Klíma discovered the diversity of tabletop
games and he opted for his own version of the RPG. Together with M. Benda, K. Papík and
V. Kadlečková, he created Dragon’s Lair, basically a simplied version of D&D.24 M. Klíma
initially published Dragon’s Lair through an unaliated publisher. Its success allowed him
to start his own publishing house Altar in 1991.
When M. Klíma and collective released Dragon’s Lair in December 1990, they exploit-
ed the unique time window between the opening of the Czechoslovak economy after the
Velvet Revolution and the ‘avalanche’ of Western RPGs such as original D&D, Shadowrun,
German Das Schwarze Auge (transl. The Dark Eye) and others in the following years. The
language barrier was a persisting issue, coupled with low purchasing power during the eco-
nomic transformation, so their game represented a convenient and aordable alternative
for the audience that after decades of neglect was starving for any fantasy-related content
and did not understand much English or German, languages of the most widespread RPGs.
The rst players of Dragon’s Lair were M. Klíma’s friends already introduced to D&D.
Among them was R. Waschka from Brno, who had known M. Klíma from meetings of sci-
fans. R. Waschka was also a member of the historical fencing society Herold, founded in
1983, w here he met V. Chvátil, another of the prime Dr agon’s Lair players and later promin ent
board game designer. According to R. Waschka, the society organised live events where
participants enacted scripted narratives about life at medieval castles, “basically LARPs”,
completely unaware of contemporar y Western LARP scenes or tabletop RPGs, considered
as one of sources of inspiration for live action role-playing.25 R. Waschka acquired a test
copy of the original edition late in 1990 and started playing by Christmas. In January 1991,
his group was staying in a country cottage where they played a continuous session for at
least a week.26 Members of the same community also soon founded the Society of Friends
23 ŠVELCH, J.: Gaming the Iron Curtain. How Teenagers and Amateurs in Communist Czechoslovakia Claimed
the Medium of Computer Games. London, Cambridge, MA : The MIT Press, 2018, p. 104.; KLÍMA, M.: Hry
nejen na hrdiny. In 518, V. (ed.): Kmeny 90: městské subkultury a nezávislé společenské proudy v letech
1989-2000. Prague : BiggBoss , 2016, p. 645.
24 KLÍMA, M.: Hry nejen na hrdiny. In 518, V. (ed.): Kmeny 90: městské subkultury a nezávislé společenské
proudy v letech 1989-2000. Prague : BiggBoss, 2016, p. 646.
25 LANCASTER, K.: Warlocks and Warpdrive: Contemporary Fantasy Entertainments With Interactive and
Virtual Environments. London, Jeerson, NC : McFarland & Company, Inc., 1999, p. 34.
26 WASCHK A, R.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 19th April 2022. 202 2.; Remark by
the autho rs: In the 1990s, V. Chvátil also worked w ith M. Klíma in Altar Interactive, designing digital game s,
before he became famous for his his board games. R. Waschka eventually added to his many occupations
digital games design as well.
ACTA LUDOLOGICA
of the Work of Mr. JRR Tolkien,27 documenting how the inter-related subcultures of histori-
cal re-enactment groups, sci- and fantasy fandom and role-playing games, evolving in
the West for decades, all collided in post-soviet countries in a few hectic years of the early
1990s.28
In addition to tabletop RPGs being constrained to few isolated groups of ‘hip’ teenag-
ers, Czechoslovakia before 1989 also had a very limited market of board games, consist-
ing primarily of variations of Parcheesi and a local clone of Monopoly, called Dostihy &
sázky (transl. Horse Racing & Betting) launched in 1984.29 Some people played the original
Monopoly, brought from Western countries.30 Some even invented their own tabletop and
board games, e.g., imitations of wargames played by brothers D. Šmihula and V. Šmihula,
or paper imitations of Monopoly, producing an unspeciable number of homebrew varia-
tions. The Šmihula brothers’ attempts at imitating wargames were based mostly on infer-
ring the gameplay from photos, since recreational wargaming was also virtually unknown
in the Czechoslovak context.31
If R. Waschka serves as an example of links between historical re-enactment, fanta-
sy fandom and role-playing games in the Czech part of the former federation, the case of
D. Šmihula (b. 1972) and his group illustrates the connection between fantasy readership
and RPGs in Slovakia. After reading J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit32 when he was seven,
D. Šmihula became a life-long fantasy fan. The Hobbit was actually the only J. R. R. Tolkien
title published in communist Czechoslovakia (the rst Slovak translation in 1973, Czech
in 1979).33 Publishing J. R. R. Tolkien’s other books and Western fantasy in general was
not ocially prohibited, rather discouraged. Local communist censors considered it low
value, trashy writing, “unclassiable under the categories of socialist literature”, and they
had ideological reservations against the genre, e.g., its use of “nonmaterialistic magic and
miracles”.34 However, intellectuals and dissidents circulated various samizdat translations
of The Lord of the Ring35 and other works. In his article on J. R. R. Tolkien’s works in the So-
viet bloc D. Šmihula argues that communist suspicion towards fantasy was fully justied.
Informal fantasy subculture “including players of role-playing games [...] in continuation of
activities of environmentalists, underground music and literary movements, companies
of historical fencing and romantic tramping indeed formed certain cultural background
[that was] alternative against the ocial communist culture and ideology”.36
27 Remark by the author s: The ocially used English version of the name of the community Společnost přátel
díla pana J.R.R. Tolkiena.
28 Remark by the authors: The Society was founded in Brno in January 1992.; O nás aneb historie a činnost
Společn osti v kostce. Released on 1st Dece mber 2008. [online]. [202 2-04-20]. Available at: <http://tolkien.
cz/?page%20id=2#>.
29 ŠVELCH, J.: Gaming the Iron Curtain. How Teenagers and Amateurs in Communist Czechoslovakia Claimed
the Medium of Computer Games. London, Cambridge, MA : The MIT Press, 2018, p. 112, 281.; Remark by
the authors: JAVOZ, the company producing Horserace Betting, in 1980s also released Marshall and Spy
(Maršál a špión), a clone of the abstract board game Stratego, or Phantom of Old Prague (Fantom staré
Prahy), a variation of the Spiel des Jahre-awarded game Scotland Yard (1983).
30 BADAČ, M.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal inter view]. Released on 11th April 2022. 2022.
31 ŠMIHULA, V.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 19th April 2022. 2022.
32 For more information, see: TOLKIEN, J. R. R.: The Hobbit. London : George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1937.
33 ŠMIHULA, D.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 19th April 2022. 2022.; Remark by
the autho rs: D. Šmihula is a lawye r, p olitical scient ist, journalist a nd writer, author of shor t sci- stories and
fantasy novel Obrancovia Liptova.; See also: ŠMIHULA, D.: Obrancovia Liptova. Bratislava : Vydavateľstvo
Hydra, 2021.
34 ŠMIHULA, D.: Tolkienovo dielo v socialistickom tábore. Released on 13th May 2018. [online]. [2022-04-17].
Available at: <https://kultura.pravda.sk/kniha/clanok/469395-tolkienovo-dielo-v-socialistickom-tabore/>.
35 For example, see: TOLKIEN, J. R. R.: The Lord of the Rings. London : George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1968.;
Remark by the authors: The individual volumes of the trilogy were published from 1954 to 1955. Unocial
Czech translation existed since 1979-1980.
36 ŠMIHULA, D.: Tolkienovo dielo v socialistickom tábore. Released on 13th May 2018. [online]. [2022-04-17].
Available at: <https://kultura.pravda.sk/kniha/clanok/469395-tolkienovo-dielo-v-socialistickom-tabore/>.
110 Game Studies
In 1990-1992, the Czech translation of The Lord of the Rings trilogy was nally re-
leased ocially, together with a deluge of other fantasy titles. Also in 1990, a group of
Czech sci- writers and fans started publishing Ikarie, the rst local magazine devoted
to sci-, fantasy and horror. In June 1990 Ikarie published an article by K. Papík, a sort of
native ad recounting typical gameplay of a new RPG game, called Dragon’s Lair.37 Later,
in the February 1991 issue, Ikarie carried an ad for Dragon’s Lair (Picture 2), associating
the game directly with the booming fantasy subculture and its most iconic staples in the
contemporary Czechoslovak context: “[The game] belongs to the family of the original,
oldest role-playing games – fantasy games. It brings to life the world of ancient legends
and heroic epics, the world of the Lord of the Rings and Conan the Barbarian”.38
Picture 2: Print advertisement for Dragon’s Lair in Ikarie, 1991. It contains no information about price, only the address
for placing an order
Source: Dračí doupě. [Print advertisement]. In Ikarie, 1991, Vol. 2, No. 2, p. 53.
Because Ikarie was also distributed in Slovakia, this was the source that rst brought
the game to the attention of many Slovak fantasy fans. For example, two of the interview-
ees, M. Badač from Bratislava and J. Krištofovič from Trnava, cite it as their source of
information and subsequent decision to order the copy from the newly founded publish-
ing house Altar.39 However, conditions were rapidly changing. The fantasy boom also led
37 See: PAPÍK, K.: Brána do jiného světa. In Ikarie, 1990, Vol. 1, No. 6, p. 46-47.
38 Dračí doupě. [Print advertisement]. In Ikarie, 1991, Vol. 2, No. 2, p. 5 3.
39 BADAČ, M.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 11th April 2022. 2022.;
KRIŠTOFOVIČ, J.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 19th April 2022. 2022.
ACTA LUDOLOGICA
to the rise of specialised genre bookshops, like the one in Bratislava, called Arrakis and
originally set-up in the changing room of the library at Klariská street. Its frequent visitor
M. Sedlačko (b. 1979), then barely teenage, was impressed by the displayed copy of the
rulebook, so he pooled money with his primary school classmates to get it.40
While a background in board games, fantasy literature or historical re-enactment
can be seen as conforming to similar Western standards of how one could become a RPG
player, M. Sústrik and P. Čejka, members of D. Šmihula’s AD&D party, represent another
specic feature of growing up in the late communist Czechoslovakia. As members of the
rst young generation introduced to Western computer games, not only they played com-
puter games before playing tabletop RPGs, but they were aware of computer games be-
fore knowing about the existence of RPGs. M. Sústrik and P. Čejka became also involved
in designing their own amateur computer games as members of the Sybilasoft collective,
producing their rst games in 1987, the same year when they allegedly started playing
AD&D with D. Šmihula.41
Like their Western counterparts, early adopters of RPGs in Czechoslovakia were
teenagers or young adults.42 In the United States in the 1960s Dave Arneson discovered
wargaming as a teenager and D. Wesely as a university student. M. Klíma (b. 1969) be-
came aware of D&D aged seventeen and he played it with his peers. The Lipšic brothers
were born in 1972; members of the D. Šmihula group were around the same age (mostly
born in 1972-1973) and did not continue playing after graduating from high school. Writ-
ing about the booming RPG scene in the United States in the 1980s, G. A. Fine described
a typical gamer as being in his late teens or early twenties, while at the same time the
median age of new players was decreasing.43 Early Slovak players of Dragon’s Lair like M.
Badač and M. Sedlačko in Bratislava also started as teenagers. Our interviewees cited
similar reasons for disengaging from the hobby as did G. A. Fine’s subjects – graduation,
marriages or jobs.44
Due to its accessibility, Dragon’s Lair quickly expanded to smaller cities and towns
around the country. J. Krištofovič (b. 1972) founded a group with his younger schoolmates
at high school in Trnava in early 19 91, M. Sedlačko usually played at clubs or cultural centres
in Bratislava, but also in Šamorín, a small town on the outskirts of the capital.45 I. Aľakša
founded a group in Šaľa, another small town in southwest Slovakia. Initially, it was just a
duo, where he was a GM and the other boy played up to ve characters. Nonetheless, in
1993, I. Aľakša started the rst Slovak fanzine for RPG players called Meč a mágia (transl.
Sword and Sorcery), producing 12 issues by 1995. In 1997 it transformed into the rst pro-
fessional fantasy magazine called simply Fantázia (transl. Fantasy), published until 2011.46
40 SEDLAČKO, M.: RP G in Czechoslovakia. [ Personal inter view]. Released on 1 3th April 2022. 202 2.; Remark by
the authors: The interviewee, nowadays a politic al and social scientist, dates this event to 1992 or 1993.
41 ŠVELCH, J.: Gaming the Iron Curtain. How Teenagers and Amateurs in Communist Czechoslovakia Claimed
the Medium of Computer Games. London, Cambridge, MA : The MIT Press, 2018, p. 193-194.; Remark by
the autho rs: Sybilasoft collective in cluded S. Hrda and brothers M. Hlaváč and J. Hlaváč. T heir games were
mostly text adventures, the genre that was in turn directly inuenced by tabletop RPGs.; AARSETH, E. J.:
Cybertext. Perspectives on Ergodic Literature. Baltimore, MA : The John Hopkins University Press, 1997, p.
98.; SÚSTRIK, M.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 26th April 2022. 2022.
42 TESAŘ, A.: Elfové a draci pro každého. In A2, 2018, Vol. 14, No. 26. [online]. [2022-05-10]. Available at:
<https://ww w. advojka.cz/archiv/2018/26/elfove-a-draci-pro-kazdeho>.; Remark by the authors: Klíma in
1994 br oke members of Hexa edr up into two main g roups: players aro und 14 years and hig h-school/college
students.; See also: NĚMEČEK , T.: D raci studenta Klímy. In Mladý svet, 1994, Vol. 36, No. 14, p. 14.
43 FINE, G. A.: Shared Fantasy – Role-Playing Games as Social Worlds. Chicago, IL : University of Chicago
Press, 1983, p. 39, 257.
44 Ibidem, p. 40.
45 KRIŠTOFOVIČ, J.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 19th April 2022. 2022.;
SEDLAČKO, M.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 13th April 2022. 2022.
46 AĽAKŠA, I.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 16th May 2022. 2022.
112 Game Studies
It is not possible to determine at this stage of research how many Dragon’s Lair copies
were distributed in the Slovak part of the federation or how many players there were. It is prob-
ably safe to assume th at it was a small percentage of the total num bers. Our interviewees we re
mostly concentrated in cities and towns of west Slovakia, having the closest ties to both the
Czech Republic and Austria, but due to the qualitative character of this preliminary survey we
are unable to say with any certainty how popular RPGs there were elsewhere in the country.
Mirroring Western gamers in yet another aspect, early participants in RPGs in
Czechoslovakia seem to be overwhelmingly male. Our interviewees played almost exclu-
sively with other boys. Only R. Waschka (b. 1968) conrmed already having female players
in his group in 1991, maybe also because he and his group were in their twenties, a few
years older than typical participants were.47 For example, M. Sedlačko was startled to see
the rst girl in another group, older as well.48 J. Průcha from České Budějovice recalls hav-
ing met female participants only after 2000, D. Šmihula registered an inux of women into
Bratislava fantasy fandom after 2000.49 These accounts seem consistent with G. A. Fine’s
ndings of around 90% male dominance in US fantasy role-playing in the 1980s, with re-
cent gures suggesting that D&D is less male-dominated than it used to be.50
The reasons Fine cited for the absence of women, i.e. their attributes, the structural
characteristics of the game, and the nature of recruitment into this subsociety, were not lost
in translation.51 Sci- and fantasy fandom were not virtually all-male hobbies like wargam-
ing, but men were still in the majority. Some notable exceptions coming from Czech sci-
clubs include V. Kadlečková and J. Vorlová who both substantially contributed to the devel-
opment of Dragon’s Lair and its publisher Altar. Sexist and chauvinist attitudes of role-play-
ing gamers documented by G. A. Fine were ubiquitous among Czechoslovak participants as
well. According to J. Průcha, when discussing playing with women, people were saying that
the game “can’t be for girls, that girls don’t have imagination, they are not interested in fan-
tastic worlds, they are more oriented towards reality and don’t like ghts”.52 Some groups
even discouraged male members from playing female characters. M. Sedlačko recalls that it
was certainly taboo, because fantasy role-playing was seen as a form of psychotherapy, not
merely entertainment, and playing a female character would thus be inauthentic, “would
betray the game’s ethos”.53 However, not all groups held identical prohibitive views.
Dissemination and reception of RPGs in Czechoslovakia (and both succession states
since 1993) seems to be devoid of one notable accompanying phenomenon occurring in
the USA: moral panic over the dangers of role-playing games throughout the 1980s and
1990s. Moral entrepreneurs aligned with the New Christian Right accused RPGs of pro-
moting Satanism and witchcraft and thus corrupting the impressionable youth, sometimes
with deadly consequences.54 Except for the sensationalist piece from 1986 mentioned
above, post-communist national media, conservative circles or society in general paid very
47 WASCHKA, R.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 19 th April 2022. 2022.
48 SEDLAČKO, M.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 13th April 2022. 2022.
49 PRŮ CHA, J.: RPG in Czecho slovakia. [Person al interview]. Relea sed on 13th April 202 2. 2022.; ŠMIHU LA, D.:
RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 19th April 2022. 2022.
50 FINE, G. A.: Shared Fantasy – Role-Playing Games as Social Worlds. Chicago, IL : University of Chicago
Press, 1983, p. 41 .; TANEN, A.: 7 Dungeons & Dragons statistics you should know about. [online]. [2022-05-
12]. Available at: <https://dicecove.com/dnd-statistics/>.
51 FINE, G. A.: Shared Fantasy – Role-Playing Games as Social Worlds. Chicago, IL : University of Chicago
Press, 1983, p. 62-71.
52 PRŮCHA, J.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 13th April 2022. 2022.; FINE, G. A.:
Shared Fantasy – Role-Playing Games as So cial Worlds. Chicago, IL : U niversity of Chic ago Press, 1983, p. 64.
53 SEDL AČKO, M.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal inter view]. Release d on 13th April 2022. 2022.
54 LAYCOCK , J. P.: D angerous Game s: What the Moral Pan ic over Role. Playing G ames Says about Pl ay, Religion ,
and Imagined Worlds. Oakland, CA : University of California Press, 2015, p. 76-176.; For more information,
see: BYERS, A .: The Satanic Panic and Dungeons & Dr agons: A Twenty- Five-year Retrospective. In BYERS,
A., CROCCO, F. (eds.): The Role-Playing Society. Essays on the Cultural Inuence of RPGs. Jeerson, NC :
McFarland & Company, Inc., 2016, p. 22-4 5.
ACTA LUDOLOGICA
little attention to the new fast-spreading hobby. However, this view has yet to be veried by
a further contemporary media study. Our respondents almost invariably denied any moral
concerns from parents or other authorities over their participation in RPG sessions. Reac-
tions, if there were any, exhibited rather incomprehension, bemusement, and occasionally
slight ridicule. Dragon’s Lair was “entertainment for nerds”, “geeks” or “weirdos”, but it was
not scapegoated as an agent behind the scandalous behaviour of deviant youth.55
Discerning reasons for this development goes beyond the scope of this study.
Provisionally, we can only point to the hecticness of early 1990s in the post-communist
Czechoslovakia, mentioned in previous sections. An abrupt economic, political and social
liberalisation after years of inertia brought a proliferation of heretofore virtually unknown
phenomena, some of them considerably harmful, such as organised crime or illicit drug
use. Suddenly, there were many far more visible (and scary) subsocieties or subcultures
than nerdy gamers such as punks, skinheads and ultras, bikers, and gangsters. There was
simply too much to worry about. Therefore, it comes as little surprise that, as our inter-
viewees recall, their parents were only “glad that we don’t take drugs”.56 Through youth lei-
sure centres, centres of culture or community clubs, various municipalities demonstrably
lent institutional support to RPG enthusiasts, indicating that the activity was not generally
perceived as malecent.57
Between Consumerism
and Participation
The commercial success of Dra gon’s Lair has been well documented. M. Klíma claims
that the rst 5,000 copies sold out in half a year.58 M. Bronec, former executive of the pub-
lishing house Altar, estimates that by the mid-1990s around 60,000 copies of the game
were sold and perhaps 100,000 people were active players (in the country of 15 million).59
In comparison, the original D&D grew much slower, taking almost a year for the rst 1,000
copies to sell out and reaching 1 million players only by the 1980s.60 The rapid expansion of
Dragon’s Lair indicates a pre-existing demand just waiting for a suitable product. M. Klíma
actually helped to fuel this demand because he both founded Hexaedr, a national club for
RPG players, and (as mentioned) advertised the game in Ikarie, months before its ocial
release. By 1994, Hexaedr had 3,500 members.61
As we focus our research particularly on the player’s experience, the 1990s inter-
est us in terms of building a player base and gaming communities. If some theorists
claim of the tabletop RPG that “they complicate our understanding of the relationship
between authors and audiences, and our denitions of these terms”, this was even more
so in the atmosphere of the 1990s, in which companies like Altar were just learning
ways of commerce and attempted to exploit the creativity of their audience for content
55 PRŮCHA, J.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 13th April 2022. 2022.; BADAČ, M.:
RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 11th April 2022. 2022.
56 ANTALEC, I.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 1 8th April 2022. 2022.
57 SEDLAČKO, M.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 13th April 2022. 2022.
58 KLÍMA, M.: Hry nejen na hrdiny. In 518, V. (ed.): Kmeny 90: městské subkultury a nezávislé společenské
proudy v letech 1989-2000. Prague : BiggBoss, 2016, p. 651.
59 ŠPLÍCHAL, P.: Po fantasy byl po revoluci hlad. In A2, 2018, Vol. 14, No. 26. [online]. [2022-05-10]. Available
at: <https://ww w.advojka.cz/archiv/2018/26/po-fantasy-byl-po-revoluci-hlad>.
60 FINE, G. A.: Shared Fantasy – Role-Playing Games as Social Worlds. Chicago, IL : University of Chicago
Press, 1983, p. 15, 26.
61 NĚMEČEK, T.: Draci studenta Klímy. In Mladý svět, 1994, Vol. 36, No. 14, p. 14.
114 Game Studies
production.62 We can understand this in terms of participatory culture, i.e. not only culture
interpreting meaning but also creating it, while still distinguishing between active partici-
pants who are involved in creating social and cultural content and those who use but do not
create such content.63 Gameplay in its various forms can be seen as a form of participatory
culture that was encouraged directly by game designers. One of the important aspects is
following or modifying the rules by players. In computer RPGs, software can quickly work
with inputs and AI can be very sophisticated, but the gameplay is still limited to what de-
signers originally intended and implemented. It cannot evolve unlike the ever-changing na-
ture of collective imagination that is working on top of prepared layout in tabletop RPGs
where rules provide objective measurement of success, but the gameplay depends on a
DM and players. Computer RPG designers can also encourage participation by integrating
modding options or other editing tools. However, it is participation of a dierent kind than
spontaneous, in-person and real-time interactions and inventions of tabletop RPG game-
play. The aforementioned gamist system was tied to the so-called “hack-and-slash” school
of playing. T. Toles-Patkin compares this to B. Sutton-Smith’s typology of games based on
age of the players. In this case, it is determined not only by the age and she connects this
straightforward style of play to the low experience level of the players.64
Our interviewees’ accounts vary in this matter and the sample is not sucient to
make a statement about the prevalence of a particular play style, but we can say that there
was some inclination to hack-and-slash style consisting of rooms of enemies waiting for
confrontation with players as described by D. M. Ewalt: “In the very rst room, they discov-
ered and defeated a nest of scorpions; in the second, they fought a gang of kobolds – short
subterranean lizard-men. They also found their rst treasure, a chest full of copper coins,
but it was too heavy to carry”.65 This corresponds with the early style of play as described
in our interviews. Some of our respondents recalled adventures in continuous rooms with
non-functioning and often non-realistic ecosystems containing only monsters to deal
with. For example, M. Sedlačko was critical of campaigns involving pure “cave eradication”
and alleged that some players who felt restricted by ocial rules started to develop their
own set of house rules and even completely new systems.66 Other accounts conrm this
notion. A. Tesař assesses the Dragon’s Lair game system as “not elaborate”, leaving much
of the gameplay to the “imagination and dramatic abilities of players, especially the DM”.
Numerous fanzines often contained attempts to x dysfunctional rules.67 J. Olt considers
the main dierence between D&D and Dragon’s Lair to be that “Lair’s rules were often
incomplete, looser and open to every possible modication and house rules”.68
Tabletop RPGs are sets of interactions dened by the rules. In theory, an omniscient
dungeon master oversees adhering to the rules, while the story can be inuenced and
co-developed by players who sometimes have little to no knowledge about the rules and
learn them from the DM while playing. Why in theory? In the current understanding of tab-
letop RPG, the focus is towards the narrative and improvisation of the players, while the
rules do not have to be taken strictly by the book. “For tabletop GMs, in-depth knowledge
62 WHI TE, W. J. et al.: Tabletop Role-Pl aying Games. In Z AGAL, J. P., DETERDING, S . (e ds.): Role-Playing Game
Studies. New York, NY : Routledge, 2018, p. 67.
63 JENKINS, H.: Textual Poachers: Television Fans & Participatory Culture. New York, NY : Routledge, 1992,
p. 22-23.
64 TOLES-PATKIN, T.: Rationa l Coordination i n the Dungeon. In Jo urnal of Popular Cultu re, 1986, Vol. 20, No. 1 ,
p. 7.
65 EWALT, D. M.: Of Dice and M en: The Story of Dungeo ns & Dragons and The P eople Who Play It. New York, NY :
Simon & Schuster, 2013, p. 6 5-66.
66 SEDLAČKO, M.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 13th April 2022. 2022.
67 TESAŘ, A.: Elfové a draci pro každého. In A2, 2018, Vol. 14, No. 26. [online]. [2022-05-10]. Available at:
<https://www.advojka.cz/archiv/2018/26/elfove-a-draci-pro-kazdeho>.
68 OLT, J.: Role-playing v zemi chatařů. In A2, 2018, Vol. 14, No. 26. [online]. [2022-05-10]. Available at:
<https://www.advojka.cz/archiv/2018/26/role-playing-v-zemi-chataru>.
ACTA LUDOLOGICA
and enforcement of the rules are not only unnecessary, but in many cases undesirable”.69
In the development of the rst RPG, the rules formed an objective and universally valid
commitment in order to restrict the decision-making by the GM. However, as early as the
1980s G. Gygax promoted the notion that rules do not determine the whole gameplay,
but “merely provide guidelines for the DM to go about setting up these scenarios”.70 Para-
doxically, his idea was better realized by the simplied localization of his game, a typically
shoddy product of the transforming post-communist culture and economy of the former
Czechoslovakia.
Conclusion
Compared to digital games, tabletop role-playing games had very limited reach in
communist Czechoslovakia. The rst contribution of our study is in presenting evidence
that D&D was not played only by M. Klíma and his circle in Prague. There were at least two
other consecutive groups that played AD&D version in Bratislava. Some members were at
the same time among the pioneers of digital game design in Slovakia.
However, apart from a few isolated groups of players in the largest cities, the public
was generally unaware of the phenomenon that was already very popular in the West. The
real breakthrough came only after the Velvet Revolution in the early 1990s with the release
of a localized clone of D&D, called Dragon’s Lair. The game was an instant success unlike in
the USA, where its growth was initially much slower. This rapid proliferation is linked to the
simultaneous boom of Western fantasy literature that was until then largely unavailable in
Czechoslovakia, restricted by the communist censorship. We conclude that the release of
Dragon’s Lair tapped into the pre-existing demand and concur with other authors who see
it as a “paramount substitutionary product” for the audience hindered by the low purchase
power and language barrier.71 Surveying some of the early adopters, we have documented
how Dragon’s Lair was disseminated in the Slovak part of the republic. The study thereaf-
ter examines players and their practices. Interviews indicate that participants shared many
characteristics with early gamers in the West; they were mostly male, teenagers or young
adults, or students. They also displayed similar interests such as participating in sci- or
fantasy fandom, historical re-enactment and LARP-like activities, or board games.
Considering the reception of RPGs, our survey indicates that due to various factors it
did not include the aspect of moral panic, as was the case in the United States in the 1980s
and 1990s. Although parents and the general public apparently did not comprehend much
of the activity, our sources indicate that it was appreciated as pro-social rather than anti-
social and supported by municipal institutions and authorities providing spaces and in-
frastructure for gamers (perhaps to keep them o the streets). This assessment needs
to be veried by the extensive study of contemporary media. With its substitutionary and
sketchy character, Dragon’s Lair encouraged a considerable investment of creativity on
the part of the players, emphasizing the association between RPGs and participatory cul-
ture. This unique conguration functioned a few years into the 1990s, until the standardi-
zation and diversication of the RPG market.
69 BARTON, M., STACKS, S.: Dungeons and Desktops. The History of Computer Role-playing Games. Boca
Raton, FL : CRC Press, 201 9, p. 12.
70 TOLES-PATKIN, T.: Rational C oordination in t he Dungeon. In Jou rnal of Popular Cultu re, 1986, Vol. 20, No. 1 ,
p. 3.
71 TESAŘ, A.: Elfové a draci pro každého. In A2, 2018, Vol. 14, No. 26. [online]. [2022-05-10]. Available at:
<https://www.advojka.cz/archiv/2018/26/elfove-a-draci-pro-kazdeho>.
116 Game Studies
Acknowledgment: The study is a partial outcome of the scientic project supported by
Cultural and Educational Grant Agency of the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and
Sport of the Slovak Republic (KEGA) No. 023UCM-4/2020, titled ‘The development of digi-
tal game studies and design’.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
AARSETH, E. J.: Cybertext. Perspectives on Ergodic Literature. Baltimore, MA : The John Hopkins
University Press, 1997.
AĽAKŠA, I.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 16th May 2022. 2022.
ANTALEC, I.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 18th April 2022. 2022.
AURITI, S.: Čí há v dračím doupěti. I n 100+1 zahraničná zajímavost, 1986, Vol. 23, N o. 14, p. 10-11. ISSN
0322-9629.
BADAČ, M.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 11th April 2022. 2022.
BARTON, M., STACKS, S.: Dungeons and Desktops. The History of Computer Role-playing Games.
Boca Raton, FL : CRC Press, 2019.
BUČEK, S.: Prvé herné komerčné subjekty na Slovensku. In JURIŠOVÁ, V., KLEMENTIS, M.,
RADOŠINSKÁ, J. (eds.): Marketing Identity 2016: Značky, ktoré milujeme. Trnava : FMK UCM in
Trnava, 2016, p. 194-208.
BYERS, A.: The Satanic Panic and Dungeons & Dragons: A Twenty- Five-year Retrospective. In
BYERS, A., CROCCO, F. (eds.): The Role-Playing Society. Essays on the Cultural Inuence of RPGs.
Jeerson, NC : McFarland & Company, Inc., 2016, p. 22-45.
COVER, J. G.: The Creation of Narrative in Tabletop Role-Playing Games. London, Jeerson, NC :
McFarland & Company, Inc., 2010.
Dračí doupě. [Print advertisement]. In Ikarie, 1991, Vol. 2, No. 2, p. 53. ISSN 1210-6798.
EDWARDS, R.: Simulationism: The Right to Dream. Released on 29th January 2003. [online]. [2022-
04-15]. Available at: <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/articles/15/>.
EDWARDS, R.: System D oes Matter. Released on 28th Janu ary 2004. [online]. [2022-04-15]. Avai lable
at: <http://www.indie-rpgs.com/_articles/system_does_matter.html>.
EWALT, D. M.: Of Dice and Men: The Story of Dungeons & Dragons and The People Who Play It. New
York, NY : Simon & Schuster, 2013.
FINE, G. A .: Shared Fantasy – Role-Playing Game s as Social Worlds. Chicago, IL : Un iversity of Chicago
Press, 1983.
JENKINS, H.: Textual Poachers: Television Fans & Participatory Culture. New York, NY : Routledge,
1992.
KIM, J. H.: Threefold Simulationism Explained. Released on 25th January 2004. [online]. [2022-05-
04]. Available at: <https://www.darkshire.net/jhkim/rpg/theory/threefold/simulationism.html>.
KLÍMA, M .: Hry nejen na hrdi ny. In 518, V. (ed.): Kmeny 90: městské subkult ury a nezávislé spole čenské
proudy v letech 1989-2000. Prague : BiggBoss, 2016, p. 638-656.
KRIŠTOFOVIČ, J.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 19th April 2022. 2022.
LANCASTER, K.: Warlocks and Warpdrive: Contemporary Fantasy Entertainments With Interactive
and Virtual Environments. London, Jeerson, NC : McFarland & Company, Inc., 1999.
LAYCOCK, J. P.: Dangerous Games: What the Moral Panic over Role. Playing Games Says about Play,
Religion, and Imagined Worlds. Oakland, CA : University of California Press, 2015.
LIPŠIC, E.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 27th April 2022. 2022.
Ma cKAY, D.: The Fantasy Role-Playing Game: A New Performing Art. Jeerson, NC : McFarland &
Company, Inc., 2001.
MOCHOCKI, M., MOCHOCKA, A.: Magia i Miecz Magazine: The Evolution of Tabletop RPG in Poland
and its Anglo-Saxon Context. In Homo Ludens, 2016, Vol. 9, No. 1, p. 167-196. ISSN 2080-4555.
NĚMEČEK, T.: Draci studenta Klímy. In Mladý svet, 1994, Vol. 36, No. 14, p. 14. ISSN 0323-2042.
ACTA LUDOLOGICA
NIKOLAIDOU, D.: The Wargame Legacy: How Wargames Shaped the Roleplaying Experience from
Tabletop to Digital Games. In HAMMOND, P., PÖTZSCH, H. (eds.): War Games: Memory, Militarism
and the Subject of Play. London, New York, NY : Bloomsbury Academic, 2019, p. 179-200.
O nás aneb historie a činnost Společnosti v kostce. Released on 1st December 2008. [online]. [2022-
04-20]. Available at: <http://tolkien.cz/?page%20id=2#>.
OLT, J .: Role-playing v zemi chata řú. In A2, 2018, Vol. 14, No. 26. ISSN 18 03-6635. [online]. [2022-05-
10]. Available at: <https://www.advojka.cz/archiv/2018/26/role-playing-v-zemi-chataru>.
PAPÍK, K.: Brána do jiného světa. In Ikarie, 1990, Vol. 1, No. 6, p. 46-47. ISSN 1210-6798.
PETERSON, J.: The Elusive Shif t: How Role-Playing Games Forged Their Identity. London, Cambridge,
MA : The MIT Press, 2020.
PRŮCHA, J.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 13th April 2022. 2022.
SEDLAČKO, M.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 13th April 2022. 2022.
SCHICK, L.: Heroic Worlds: A History and Guide to Role-playing Games. Bualo, NY : Prometheus
Books, 1991.
SÚSTRIK, M.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 26th April 2022. 2022.
ŠMIHULA, D.: Obrancovia Liptova. Bratislava : Vydavateľstvo Hydra, 2021.
ŠMIHULA, D.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 19th April 2022. 2022.
ŠMIHULA, D.: Tolkienovo dielo v socialistickom tábore. Released on 13th May 2018. [online]. [2022-
04-17]. Available at: <https://kultura.pravda.sk/kniha/clanok/469395-tolkienovo-dielo-v-
socialistickom-tabore/>.
ŠMIHULA, V.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 19th April 2022. 2022.
ŠPLÍCHAL, P.: Po fantasy byl po revoluci hlad. In A2, 2018, Vol. 14, No. 26. ISSN 1803-6635. [online].
[2022-05-10]. Available at: <https://www.advojka.cz/archiv/2018/26/po-fantasy-byl-po-revoluci-
hlad>.
ŠVELCH, J.: Gaming the Iron Curtain. How Teenagers and Amateurs in Communist Czechoslovakia
Claimed the Medium of Computer Games. London, Cambridge, MA : The MIT Press, 2018.
TANEN, A.: 7 Dungeons & Dragons statistics you should know about. [online]. [2022-05-12]. Available
at: <https://dicecove.com/dnd-statistics/>.
TESAŘ, A.: Elfové a draci pro každého. In A2, 2018, Vol. 14, No. 26. ISSN 1803-6635. [online]. [2022-
05-10]. Available at: <https://www.advojka.cz/archiv/2018/26/elfove-a-draci-pro-kazdeho>.
TOLES-PATKIN, T.: Rational Coordination in the Dungeon. In Journal of Popular Culture, 1986, Vol.
20, No. 1, p. 1-14. ISSN 1540-5931.
TOLKIEN, J. R. R.: The Hobbit. London : George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1937.
TOLKIEN, J. R. R.: The Lord of the Rings. London : George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1968.
TRESCA, M. J.: The Evolution of Fantasy Role-Playing Games. Jeerson, NC : McFarland & Company,
Inc., 2011.
WASCHKA, R.: RPG in Czechoslovakia. [Personal interview]. Released on 19th April 2022. 2022.
WATERS, D.: What happ ened to Dungeons and Dr agons?. Releas ed on 26th April 2004. [online]. [2022-
05-04]. Available at: <http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/3655627.stm>.
WHITE, W. J.: The Right to Dream of the Middle Ages: Simulating the Medieval in Tabletop RPGs. In
KLINE, D. T. (ed.): Digital Gaming Re-imagines the Middle Age. New York, NY : Routledge, 2018, p.
15-28.
WHITE, W. J. et al.: Tabletop Role-Playing Games. In ZAGAL, J. P., DETERDING, S. (eds.): Role-Playing
Game Studies. New York, NY : Routledge, 2018, p. 63-86.
ZAGAL, J. P., DETERDING, S.: Denitions of “Role-playing Games”. In ZAGAL, J. P., DETERDING, S.
(eds.): Role-Playing Game Studies. New York, NY : Routledge, 2018, p. 19-51.
ZENIMAX ONLINE STUDIOS: The Elder Scrolls Online. [digital game]. Rockville, MD : Bethesda
Softworks, 2014.
