Fantasy Productions Medienvertriebsgesellschaft GmbH (a.k.a. FanPro) is a German publishing company based in

Erkrath Erkrath () is a town in the Mettmann (district), district of Mettmann, in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Geography Erkrath is situated on the river Düssel, directly east of Düsseldorf and west of Wuppertal, close to the famous Neandertal. It ...

History

The company was founded in 1983 by

Ulrich Kiesow Ulrich Kiesow was one of the co-founders of Fantasy Productions (FanPro) in 1983, together with Werner Fuchs (game designer), Werner Fuchs and Hans Joachim Alpers. He was the translator of the first German language editions of both ''Tunnels & Tr ...

Werner Fuchs Werner Fuchs (25 October 1948 – 11 May 1999) was a German football player and coach. Playing career Fuchs was born in Kaiserslautern. A centre forward, he began his professional career in 1967 with a professional contract at 1. FC Kais ...

and

Hans Joachim Alpers Hans Joachim Alpers (14 July 1943 – 16 February 2011) was a German writer and editor of science fiction and fantasy. Together with Werner Fuchs and Ulrich Kiesow he founded Fantasy Productions, which became one of the premier German RPG- and b ...

to produce small metal miniature figures. When the Droemer Knaur Verlag and the Schmidt Spiel & Freizeit GmbH published Kiesow's

role playing game A role-playing game (sometimes spelled roleplaying game, or abbreviated as RPG) is a game in which players assume the roles of characters in a fictional setting. Players take responsibility for acting out these roles within a narrative, eith ...

" Das Schwarze Auge", Kiesow organised the editorial work at FanPro. After the bankruptcy of the ''Schmidt Spiel & Freizeit GmbH'' in 1997, FanPro published ''Das Schwarze Auge'' by itself.

FanPro LLC

Fantasy Productions had spent years translating

FASA FASA Corporation was an American publisher of role-playing games, wargaming, wargames and board games between 1980 and 2001, after which they closed publishing operations for several years, becoming an IP holding company under the name FASA In ...

products into German, and when FASA closed in 2001,

WizKids NECA/WizKids, LLC (commonly known as simply WizKids) is an American company based in New Jersey that produces tabletop games. WizKids is best known for its collectible miniatures games (CMGs) Mage Knight, HeroClix, MechWarrior, and HorrorCli ...

licensed some of the FASA game rights to the Fantasy Productions principals. Fantasy Productions expressed interest in obtaining a license for ''

Shadowrun ''Shadowrun'' is a science fantasy tabletop role-playing game set in an alternate future in which cybernetics, magic in fiction, magic and fantasy creatures co-exist. It combines genres of cyberpunk, urban fantasy, and crime fiction, crime, wit ...

'' before Rob Boyle was able to make a bid, so Fantasy Productions founder Werner Fuchs invited Boyle to visit him in Germany, and Boyle soon set up and ran the new corporation FanPro LLC, created by two Fantasy Productions principals and Boyle. Fantasy Productions created FanPro LLC as a subsidiary in the USA to hold the FASA game line rights. FanPro licensed ''Shadowrun'' in early 2001 with Boyle as Line Editor, and FanPro also licensed ''

Battletech ''BattleTech'' is a wargaming and military science fiction franchise launched by FASA Corporation in 1984, acquired by WizKids in 2001, which was in turn acquired by Topps in 2003; and published since 2007 by Catalyst Game Labs. The trademark ...

'' six months later and hired Randall Bills to continue working as ''Battletech'' Line Editor; Bills became the second and only other employee of FanPro LLC. FanPro LLC also began producing English translations of German role-playing games beginning with ''

The Dark Eye Dark Eye(s) or The Dark Eye may refer to: Film, television, theater, and audio drama * Dark Eyes (1935 film), ''Dark Eyes'' (1935 film), a 1935 French drama film * Dark Eyes (play), ''Dark Eyes'' (play), a 1943 play by Elena Miramova in collabo ...

'' (2003), a translation of the top German fantasy RPG ''Das Schwarze Auge'' (1984) which on its fourth edition (2002) in Germany by Fantasy Productions; ''The Dark Eye'' was centered on a metaplot like the FASA game lines, which was advanced in both adventures and the magazine ''Aventurische Bote'' from Fantasy Productions. ''The Dark Eye'' did not sell well in the US, so FanPro LLC did not further supported the game and did not publish ''Degenesis'' as intended in late 2006 as another translation of a second German RPG. From 2001 to 2005, FanPro LLC released over a dozen original Shadowrun titles and reprinted core titles that FASA had originally released. In 2005, FanPro LLC released

, Fourth Edition. Likewise, FanPro LLC continued to release new Classic

BattleTech ''BattleTech'' is a wargaming and military science fiction franchise launched by FASA Corporation in 1984, acquired by WizKids in 2001, which was in turn acquired by Topps in 2003; and published since 2007 by Catalyst Game Labs. The trademark ...

books in English, and in 2006 released ''Total Warfare'', the first in a series of revised full-color books for Classic

. FanPro GmbH continued to translate these books into German, along with German-only

books.

Licenses selling

Until early in 2007 FanPro was a

publisher Publishing is the activities of making information, literature, music, software, and other content, physical or digital, available to the public for sale or free of charge. Traditionally, the term publishing refers to the creation and distribu ...

for fantasy books and various

s. The company owned licensing agreements with

to produce the German-language versions of

Classic BattleTech ''Classic BattleTech'' is a table-top wargame set in the fictional ''BattleTech'' universe that simulates combat between futuristic mechanized forces. Originally published by FASA Corporation, the game is now produced by Catalyst Game Labs und ...

, Pirates of the Spanish Main, and the " Clix" games of

Mage Knight ''Mage Knight'' is a miniatures wargame using collectible figures, created by WizKids, Inc, and is the earliest example of what is now known as a collectible miniatures game (or CMG). The game was designed by founder Jordan Weisman along wit ...

and

HeroClix HeroClix is a collectible miniatures game that uses the Clix system that centers on the world of superhero comic books, especially DC and Marvel universes. Players construct teams of comic book heroes, villains, or characters from various video ...

. FanPro maintained a small staff so they used the fulfilment company Fast Forward Entertainment for warehousing and shipping but when that company went under, they took the profits that they had not yet paid FanPro for their books. Fantasy Productions in Germany began divesting themselves of game properties in April 2007 due to their own difficulties, first selling ''Das Schwarze Auge'' and soon all the others; Fantasy Productions needed support from the gaming stock that FanPro LLC warehoused, so while FanPro LLC needed support from Fantasy Productions they were instead supporting Fantasy Productions. Boyle and Bills attempted to purchase FanPro LLC from Fantasy Productions but when that failed they threatened to leave bid for the WizKids licenses when they came up for renewal; WizKids came to mediate and while they would not allow Boyle and Bills to start a new company, they did grant the licenses to InMediaRes. The license for ''Das Schwarze Auge'' went to Ulisses Spiele. Since then the company focuses on publishing novels only, although it continued its preexisting novel series for ''Das Schwarze Auge'' ; the ''Shadowrun'' and ''BattleTech'' series ceased publications in 2008, following disagreements between WizKids and Fantasy Productions concerning the German license for those properties.

References

External links

German website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fantasy Productions Book publishing companies of Germany Companies based in North Rhine-Westphalia Publishing companies of Germany Role-playing game publishing companies Publishing companies established in 1983