Designing Augmented Reality Board Games: The BattleBoard 3D experience

This paper discusses the design of BattleBoard 3D (BB3D) which is an ARToolkit based game prototype, featuring the use of LEGO bricks for the physical and digital pieces. BB3D is a novel type of an AR game augmenting traditional board games with features from computer games. The initial experiments involving kids indicate that it is promising with respect to add computer game excitement to board games and to add a social dimension to computer games. The paper discusses the concept for the game, implementation issues, the physical setting for the game, user interfaces, as well as tailorable pieces and warriors. Based on qualitative experiments with children, we discuss central design issues for future AR board games.