Semelectronic tools for creating board games

Jul 30 2022

Semelectronic tools for creating board games

I suppose designing a board game requires a lot of iterations.
To aid this I suggest small electronic modules, preferably with 3D printable form factors.

Say you have round markers with differenct graphics on, dragons, horses and eggs. Why not have small, marker sized, colour LCD displays?
Then when trying out a new game idea with 10 dragons, 10 horses and 10 eggs, you realise there should be 5 dragons, 10 horses and 25 eggs. Just change graphis on the markers. The result is the same as having card board tokens and drawing more eggs and throwing some dragons in the waste basket; but without the mental friction of throwing the markers with the sketched dragons away.

Say you redesign the board from a square pattern to a hexagonal. Why not bring forth your 3D printer with ready made blue prints for hex adapters ?
If the display has a known form it should be easy to pre construct all types of forms and shapes. Now printing takes a while so they should probably be printed in advance. But on the other hand they can be reused.

The board could be likewise adaptable. It could be a LCD screen, like a big ipad. It could be lego. It could be a piece of card board and erasable pens. But that is another idea.

Likewise more dynamic dice are another idea in another article.

The battery doesn’t have to last forever, this is just for designing a game and iterating its mechanics. Recharge everything every night.

If the LCD display is exchanged for e paper there is no need for a battery at all.

Another idea would be to have already made round, square and hex markers, more paper with round, square and hex outlines and sticky spray. Just draw the graphics inside the lines, cut, spray, and attach the paper cuts to the markers. Faster, cheaper and just as fun.
This idea also matches the cardboard-and-erasable-pens outlined above.

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