[gault8121]

Board games can connect people in ways video games cannot. There is a level of rapid interaction, brought about by being at a shared table, which cannot be mimicked digitally.

If you like Settles of Catan, and you are looking for something more advanced, I'd highly suggest Eclipse, Twilight Imperium, and Puerto Rico. These are challenging games that require careful resource management, political negotiations, and long term strategic thinking. In many ways these games mirror the challenges of building a company.

[anigbrowl]

a shared table, which cannot be mimicked digitally

Not to dispute your point (I like tactility too), but I am very interested to see where the next wave of 'coffee tble computers' go, eg Panasonic's 4k toughpad (http://www.panasonic.com/business/toughpad/us/windows-4k-tab...) when they reach commodity rather than vanity pricing (they're $5-6k now, aimed at medical/media professionals).

[VLM]

4K pixels is pretty low res compared to board games. At 400 DPI thats only about 10 inches of a board game, which is pretty small.

Something like Agricola expands to encompass all space. That's actually a pretty serious issue if you get into "huge" games like steel wolves.

Only slightly off topic, card driven games (not strictly board games, because there is no board) like Dominion and the Pathfinder card game also expand to encompass all space.

One big problem is TVs / computers / monitors are value engineered to only last 2-3 years before replacement, whereas my Carcassone sets from 15 years ago are all fully playable. I'm not saying its an impossible problem, I'm just saying if you try to push tech into board games you're going to get pushback from people who have a copy of Axis and Allies from 1991 which they still play and they're not going to be happy if you try to sell them a $1000 monitor that only lasts two years.

[r00fus]

This - even back in 2010, I remember many fun days of playing Multi-pong (which has changed it's name more times than I could count) and Wurdle - both were really fun 3-4 player games that a 10" made sharable.

Something a bit larger would be great for simpler board games and maybe 4-6 players. Combined with an ability to sense external pieces/cards, the computer could handle the rule processing and drudgery while the humans could interact closely.

[pessimizer]

I think board games on table touchscreens would already be common if there were an open platform/framework to program them on, and they took advantage of additional phones/tablets over IP. The manufacturing cost on big touchscreens is already pretty low.

[VLM]

The term you need to google for is "vassal engine"

Note the engine might be open but there's all kinds of schemes WRT the data files ranging from "we don't care" to DMCA takedowns to the max.

Also some people are simply tactile and really want meeples and feelies in their games, so an ipad is going to be a very rough sell to them simply because they very explicitly don't want a screen experience.

Also the resolution of a tablet is incredibly low. Maybe some kind of google glass thing can be implemented, walking around in a backyard? I've occasionally considered this problem and I feel cramped at a mere 5-ft round table and 5 feet at 300 dpi is something like eighteen thousand pixels, assuming you can "invest" in a 5 foot round screen and the best COTS available now is only about a tenth of that resolution at that size...

[anigbrowl]

Most interesting, thanks! I don't expect board games on touch screens to take over and your points about allowing games to spread out is well made. But it will be interesting to see how they continue to evolve in parallel.

[scrumper]

Thanks for this! I'd started creating a spreadsheet to hold state for Twilight Struggle so my wife and I could enjoy a game over a week without our toddler destroying the board. This looks much better.

[tannerc]

Agreed, and I think a lot of it has to do with the physical presence of the board, pieces, cards, etc. as well.

Something video games can't offer players is that tangible appeal, where you have to feel the weight of a card or game piece lifted from the table or board and then slamming it back down.

The innate psychology of being able to feel even the tiniest of texture and weight of an object is something we may never get from digital technology. Which gives board games and paper books at least one rare advantage.

[webmaven]

A few years ago some students built a D&D prototype for the MS Surface Table computer that looked pretty awesome: http://vimeo.com/surfacescapes

The use of actual figurines with fiducial markers to control the UI was particularly interesting.

[tannerc]

This is excellent, thanks for sharing. Do you know of any similar developments for smaller tablets?

[webmaven]

Unfortunately, no, I don't.

[sentenza]

As a frequent player of Twilight Imperium I want to add a caveat to your comment: _DO_ play Twilight Imperium, but please be aware that you need a place to set it up where it can remain for a week or so in order to finish the game in multiple sittings.

Many players prematurely give up on this game when they notice that it takes about 8-12 hours to play through.

If you are prepared to play a game of TI in 2-3 sittings, you'll notice that it is rich, deep, non-repetitive and highly addictive.