boardgames

Integrating AI into electronic games is hard, let alone tabletop or board games, and Hasbro's shown the capacity to fuck up the much easier task of "sit on the legendary DND IP, let it function, and just sit back and count the river of money that floods in to you as a result." If Hasbro's performance at operating the DND brand is anything to go by, traditional board game designers have not a lot to worry about in the near future I think.

If you integrate the digital into an analog game, it's no longer an analog game. It's now a video game with a physical dongle. Looking at you LoTR:JtME!

Just... make... it... fun and I'll play and don't make me sign up for a service or give away my data.

The only way to truly implement something like this would be with a digital board game framework similar to the Teburu system, which is an overpriced and uninspired bloated piece of junk. I have played around with my friend's version as he was trying to sell it to me, it only has a few games for it and they are hundreds of dollars each. Each game has loads of bugs and every time he gets it out it needs to be charged, receives multiple updates, has tons of hoops to jump through just to play. When we finally set it up, he realized his dice wasn't charged. This type of thing is exactly the opposite of classic board games that are just analogue pieces you can set up and play any time, even by candlelight. I don't see AI driven board games gaining any traction, especially since the frameworks needed to house them aren't really well done either. And honestly, we don't need it. Games are well designed enough to provide lots of branching options and paths to victory. AI is just a buzzword people are trying to shove into everything.

An excerpt:

AI-driven game mechanics excite board game enthusiasts, opening doors to more immersive and realistic gameplay. By delegating behind-the-scenes decision-making to AI algorithms, players can focus on the action unfolding before them rather than getting bogged down by complex behavior cards or rule sheets. Xplored envisions a board game landscape that mirrors video games, where meeples and tokens become dynamic counterparts to the traditional controller.

While the promise of AI in board games holds immense potential for enhancing entertainment value, some cautious voices raise concerns about the potential impact on creative workers. Drawing parallels with the entertainment industry’s experimentation with AI-written scripts amid labor strikes, some fear that an AI-driven approach could lead to unemployment and obscurity for board game designers. Having previously flirted with the tech trend of NFTs, Hasbro is not immune to the allure of Silicon Valley’s latest golden geese, including Kickstarter and blockchain.