[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.