Boardgames, Meet Apps

When Life hands you iPads, make apps.

The convergence of boardgames and tablets is happening fast. Check out what Hasbro is showing at Toy Fair: Monopoly, Battleship and The Game of Life in special appified versions. The iPad sits in the middle of the board, and the spinner is on the iPad. As are funny videos that play as you move through the board, from Americ'as Funniest Home Videos. Will they fly? They may not right away, but at the rate tablets are being adopted it shouldn't be long before this becomes popular. (Estimates are that Apple alone may sell more than 45 million tablets this year, and that may be conservative once the iPad 3 hits and they (maybe) reduce the price of the iPad 2.)
Then there's this app, which is shown here:

You have pieces you move around the outside, which integrates with the software (the board knows where your pieces are). I talked to these guys at CES, and tried to convince them to go to the GAMA Trade Show and sign up some adventure game companies.

Really, the adventure game industry (RPGs, boradgames, and miniatures alike) needs to get over to smartphones and tablets ASAP, preferably last year. The ability to completely distribute digitally is an amazing transformation of the business. Not to mention cost savings, and the fact that the core adventure game demographic overwhelmingly has a smartphone, and tablets are growing even faster than smartphones now.

The future is arriving at a rapid pace; get with it or you're history.