I dunno, Dark Sun was the shit for a while when it came out, to the point where I wondered why so much fantasy suddenly looked like Mad Max and S&M crossed themselves in some kind of bizarre cult. The same way punk was so present in the art of games for a while as well. Or Goth culture. It's just trends and fads. Tolkienesque (and really, please emphasize the esque) fantasy is going strong because there's just so many pretender products out there reacting to either a) the actual Tolkien novels b) the Jackson movie trilogies or c) the pile of D&D works that have been pumped out since the 80s.

But D&D fantasy, which is what I call D&D's approach to fantasy, has the advantage that it is very game-able (for reasons better expressed earlier in this thread). And what is it? Bits of just about every fantastic element the creators and subsequent writers thought was cool and stitched into this setting, not caring if its internally consistent or works. D&D Fantasy is about as coherent as the Godzilla canon, but people love both for about the same reasons.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;919448You miss my point.  To anybody but a hardcore "Tolkien canon wanker," D&D is INDISTINGUISHABLE from Lord of the Rings.

Most people are casual whatevers.  Casual readers, casual gamers, casual golf players, et cetera.

D&D isn't "Tolkienesque," to the OVERWHELMING majority of people who are familiar with both, they are identical.

NO, I got that point. I was saying that that wasn't the point of the OP.

But as for the "most people are casuals" statement, there's a whole topic detour we could take on that. Whenever the perennial topic of "RPGs are dying! Why won't more people play RPGs" topic pops up, I've said many times that RPGs won't get many new players because RPG designers cater to hardcore RPGers, who want really detailed game systems they can learn to master, whereas all those people who might potentially become roleplayers, but don't? They're casuals. They don't want a game you have to study. They'd prefer not to learn the rules at all. They just want to pretend to be an elf or something. And the general reaction on RPG forums to players who don't want to learn the rules or master the system is one of hate. All those threads about "Why is this one player I game with so stupid? Can't he learn which dice to roll?" and "Why are some players playing non-optimal characters?"

But yeah, that's a digression.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;919826Right! Most people THINK D&D is the same as Tolkien, but actually D&D is a generic fantasy sludge made up of a lot of different sources.  It's very popularity is from that it is the bastard child of a billion fathers; it contains elements of sources ranging from fairy tales to cheezy Hollywood costume films to hundreds of books to Disney movies to Princess Bride to Monty Python.

This was a point I was making earlier, to directly answer the OP question. Kitchen sink settings have a little bit of everything, something for everyone. Every "non-Tolkienesque" fantasy appeal to a smaller group. So, of course, D&D and settings like that is more popular, because bigger group > smaller group, every time.

Another perennial topic related to this one is "why aren't sci-fi RPGs more popular?" It's because there's no real kitchen sink sci-fi setting. Space empire sci-fi plays out much differently than post-apoc sci-fi, near-future sci-fi, or hardcore sci-fi. Star Trek and Star Wars come closest to mass appeal, but they are still not universal, and despite some overlap, appeal to distinct groups of fans... and neither will appeal to hardcore post-apoc fans.

Quote from: talysman;920220Another perennial topic related to this one is "why aren't sci-fi RPGs more popular?" It's because there's no real kitchen sink sci-fi setting. Space empire sci-fi plays out much differently than post-apoc sci-fi, near-future sci-fi, or hardcore sci-fi. Star Trek and Star Wars come closest to mass appeal, but they are still not universal, and despite some overlap, appeal to distinct groups of fans... and neither will appeal to hardcore post-apoc fans.

But then there wasn't a kitchen-sink fantasy setting either until D&D smashed together every aspect of mythology from every different pantheons, sword & sorcery stories, medieval history - real and not, world folklore, Tolkien and his peers, cowboys and indians, Star Trek, the music of Pink Floyd, McDonalds, Gilligan's Island, Ben Hur, the Arabian Nights, Disneyland and Hammer Horror movies and brew what we think of as fantasy.

The fact that same feat was never quite pulled off for sci-fi (and when we say sci-fi in this sort of content most of use mean space opera) doesn't prove that it could not have been done.

Quote from: Coffee Zombie;920218I dunno, Dark Sun was the shit for a while when it came out, to the point where I wondered why so much fantasy suddenly looked like Mad Max and S&M crossed themselves in some kind of bizarre cult. The same way punk was so present in the art of games for a while as well. Or Goth culture. It's just trends and fads. Tolkienesque (and really, please emphasize the esque) fantasy is going strong because there's just so many pretender products out there reacting to either a) the actual Tolkien novels b) the Jackson movie trilogies or c) the pile of D&D works that have been pumped out since the 80s.

I don't think that's really the case.  It just looks like it's the case.  Some people were very enthusiastic about Dark Sun and very vocal about that enthusiasm but sales were much lower than sale for Forgotten Realms.  A few people gushed about Dark Sun and the silent majority went on playing Forgotten Realms.  A few vocal people in a particular community create the impression that this or that game is the new hotness when this really isn't the case.  RPG.net is the perfect microcosm of this in action.  There is a long succession of rpg.net darlings that have come and gone.  If you went there years ago, you might get the impression that, say, Dogs in the Vineyard was the new hot fad that everyone was talking about.  The was the rpg.net darling for a while.  There was lots of buzz about it.  Any time someone came on to ask for a system for some RPG they were going to run, someone suggested Dogs in the Vineyard regardless of how far they had to stretch to get the system to fit.  It was everywhere.  In the real world, it was little known and little cared about micro-press RPG.  It was certainly never a fad except in that community.  I thin a lot of apparent fads are really just a few very vocal and active people gushing about their latest infatuation.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;918870None of that explains why settings which expanded generic fantasy were not successful.

Eberron is D&D with steampunk and pulp added.
Planescape is D&D with infinite planes of wonder and horror added.
Spelljammer is D&D in space.

All three of those are absurdly popular even now and their main failings were bad timing and company mismanagement.

Quote from: Bren;919603I read Sword of Shannara. You can't make me read it again.

Did Urshurak have a female hero and some type of crystal focused ray guns? If so, then you can't make me read it again either.

So... I shouldnt like tell you there was plans for a movie way way back?

Oh... and Yeh. Ray gun. Check.

Quote from: kosmos1214;919905Now for contrast Turkish star was https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ww0k-80n-zI

And thrers that Russian star trek knock off that i cant find a clip of.  

1: Dünyayı Kurtaran Adam. Its not Star Wars. It just uses clips from it and has some inevitable costume rip-offs. Weird movie.

2: Star Wreck? Thats Finnish. There is though a Turkish Star Trek that actually is a Star Trek rip-off.

Almost everytime I pass by the Shannara books on the shelves of the local bookstore, for the briefest moment in my mind's eye I interpret the title as "The Sword of Shanana". I have the nagging feeling that somewhere, in another dimension or the recesses of Lucien's Library, there is a book called The Sword of Shanana, and it is awesome in every way the Shanara book was awful.

Quote from: yosemitemike;920283I don't think that's really the case.  It just looks like it's the case.  Some people were very enthusiastic about Dark Sun and very vocal about that enthusiasm but sales were much lower than sale for Forgotten Realms.  A few people gushed about Dark Sun and the silent majority went on playing Forgotten Realms.

It might have been a "in my city" kind of thing. I was honestly confused why it was everywhere and everyone was talking about. When I was looking for some tolkienesque fantasy to play, I couldn't find it for a while.

Quote from: Omega;920349So... I shouldnt like tell you there was plans for a movie way way back?

There's a Shannara TV series. Watched the first half dozen episodes. It sucked.

QuoteOh... and Yeh. Ray gun. Check.

Yeah that was what I thought I remembered. It sucked. A lot.

Quote from: Bren;920382There's a Shannara TV series. Watched the first half dozen episodes. It sucked.

Then you missed out on the really terrible stuff. I think my favorite was the flashy rave party (preceded by a viewing of Star Trek) the racist human commune held that ended in a Wild West-style gunfight.

Quote from: Brand55;920410Then you missed out on the really terrible stuff. I think my favorite was the flashy rave party (preceded by a viewing of Star Trek) the racist human commune held that ended in a Wild West-style gunfight.

:eek:

Quote from: Bren;920414:eek:

Oh yes. It was hilarious to watch the humans boo Spock because they thought he was an elf.

Quote from: TristramEvans;920352Almost everytime I pass by the Shannara books on the shelves of the local bookstore, for the briefest moment in my mind's eye I interpret the title as "The Sword of Shanana".

[ATTACH=CONFIG]392[/ATTACH]

Quote from: Coffee Zombie;920366It might have been a "in my city" kind of thing. I was honestly confused why it was everywhere and everyone was talking about.

My gut impression was that since it started everyone at third level and had a lot of OMG SO METAL spells, it appealed strongly to the munchkins and adolescent power fantasy gamers.  That was the zeitgeist around here, anyway.

Quote from: Omega;920349Oh... and Yeh. Ray gun. Check.

Now I find myself wondering if Sam Raimi has read that, because there's an episode of Hercules: The Legendary Journeys set in Atlantis that's eerily similar in visual style.

Quote from: Brand55;920410I think my favorite was the flashy rave party (preceded by a viewing of Star Trek) the racist human commune held that ended in a Wild West-style gunfight.

...this is not the Shannara I remember.

Quote from: BoxCrayonTales;918801Why is the fantasy market so stagnant?

I was one of the people who had some interest in Exalted because it was non-Tolkien.  I can't say I particularly favored the system and some of the influences (not a huge anime fan), but I did like a fantasy game with a shortage of Elves and Orcs.  

It's hard to move away from the references you mentioned, because they're quite literally everywhere. When I was a kid the main 'fantasy' influence I had was Conan and Willow.  

Maybe it's also because we have difficulty moving away from things we're familiar with?  Having 'like humans except X' in a fantasy setting makes it easier for people to roleplay, I guess.  Easier to take inspiration from other sources, maybe?

Eh.  I think there should be more 'weird' science fiction.