would ensure that in the racing phase each sector would see one race to each other sector and one to a special run, to ensure a uniform distribution of the races. In the game's late-1980s and early-1990s heyday, Watts appeared to target a more "gamer" than "family" audience, producing maps on larger hex sheets and with 52 towns indexed by cards rather than the 42 given by the towns + special runs. This led to games taking longer to complete; this appears to have been unpopular with the market, as from 1992 on new map designs in general went back to having 36 towns + special runs and using smaller hex sheets. At this point Watts began to make more use of "small towns", towns which shared their index number with one other town and only scored 3 points rather than 6 for the first player to connect to them; this seems to have been a compromise to allow him to encourage the development of historically occurring tracks without lengthening the game. The original maps are now out of print. Nevertheless, hundreds of after-market maps have been developed for Railway Rivals (including one for Middle-earth), and they can be developed straightforwardly by enthusiasts. The results of games of Railway Rivals can be compared with the way that real railways developed in a particular area. Publication history David 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 demonstrate how geography and competition had resulted in railways being developed in some places but not others. He self-published the game through his own company, Rostherne Games, initially in kit form (hex sheets and colouring instructions) for several years before it was released in a boxed set by Fairmount Simulation Gaming. Watts also sold many individual laminated paper maps covering specific areas of England, Scotland, and India, together with brief instructions and the special dice required. The German games company Bütehorn published a German-language edition in 1979 titled Dampfross (Steam Steed), and it became a finalist for Spiel des Jahres 1980. The game only sold 1,000 copies, and Bütehorn went bankrupt. Schmidt Spiele acquired the German-language license and Knut-Michael Wolf completely revised the rules. The new edition was released in 1983, and subsequently won the Spiel des Jahres in 1984, resulting in some complaints, since only new game