AMALGAMATE: A Board Gaming Framework Using PDAs
Abstract
Many forms of media have gone digital in today's computer age, however board games have yet to completely make the transition to a digital representation. There are several board games playable on computers and even some board gaming frameworks already exist, but none duplicate the true experience of playing a physical board game. This is because many board games involve private elements, for example cards in a player's hand. In order for such games to be playable, every user requires a separate private terminal or computer. Use of a standard workstation or even a laptop creates a disconnect between players and eliminates one of the most important parts of any such game: interaction -- the experience of sitting together in the same room around a game "board". I intend to demonstrate a framework for playing board games that allows each player to have their own private view of game components while sharing a public display of the playing area.