Touch Tablets

[nedjer]

This won't be as off topic as it may seem at first

We're expecting a rash of new 'touch netbooks' this year: the MS Courier, the iSlate, Google's offering at the end of the year. I reckon these are a great idea if done right and blogged on it the other day under the heading 'Touch Technologies and Gaming'.

That was about games in general but I've been wondering about tablets and tabletop RPGs since then. Readability and portability, along the lines of the large Kindle DX, would certainly change the use of PDFs. No more need to lug a portable around or, alternatively, to peer into a tiny screen.

One possible outcome of this is the death of the hardback copy, as the whole of a searchable, all volumes set of 4e would out feature, and price, sets of books. E.g. instead of ten hardbacks at $20, you could buy a tablet and a DDI inscription and be done. I.e $200 or $30/ year and over two years you get a free tablet.

I'm not saying this is necessarily 'good news' but I can see these devices, especially the suggested Google $300 touch netbook, bringing a lot of changes.

The D&D/ MS Surface table videos and D&D take these changes into how we play rather than 'oversee' play and I'm again wondering if there'll be big changes as it becomes practical to drag units around and between touch tablets in the same room.

That's about as far as I've got so far and I'd sure like to know other views. Maybe people just like hardbacks too much. Or the up front cost of touch netbooks won't appeal as much as buying a book at a time?

 

[Mark]

I don't think it is about PDFs anymore for WotC. Until there is wireless access everywhere you play, these devices won't be as completely useful to tabletop gaming with DDI support as they could be (perhaps someone with a subscription could detail the non-wireless pros and cons of DDI these days?). People who game at gamestores need to keep lobbying their gamestore owners to invest in a wireless network for their patrons. Those who game at home and like DDI probably have set up home wireless access, I would think. For other companies who do sell their full product lines as PDFs, this will be a big boon. I know I have been looking forward to this type of technology to advance. Huzzah!

 

[Morrus]

I've been following the iSlate rumours. Unfortunately, they're all just rumours at this point. Apparently we'll find out on Jan 26. What Apple does really well is interface and marketing. They might not produce the best devies on the market, but they tend to produce very attractive, accessible devices with massive publicity - so if anyone is going to "iPod/iPhone" the tablet market, I'd put my money on them.

As for the availablity of wireless connections - I can't speak for everyone, but in my life they're freely available and abundant, both in my home town, homes I visit (especially those I go to for gaming purposes) and in public places. And from what I hear, that's gonna be pretty ubiquitous in not too much time as companies invest heavily in widespread wireless services.

 

[Mark]

Tell that to my gamestore.


Truth is, aside from home(s) and the gamestore, there aren't really a lot of "public" places suited to tabletop RPGing. Aside from the space consideration, the noise factor is there, and if it is a business (like a coffee shop) then taking over a space to game for a few hours is likely to be frowned upon even if you buy coffee and cakes. A university setting might work, outside of the library, of course. Last year at Gencon the convention hall(s) had wireless but the prices were too steep for my liking, considering I only wanted to be able to check email now and again while I was running games most of each of the four days, during the daytime hours, late morning until late afternoon. I think it was about $15.00 per day (anyone here that signed up for that?).

Anyway, I am liking what I see of the features of the Que though I think the information is thus far incomplete. It's on the bigger side, about as big as an 8 1/2 x 11 inch pad of paper, so we'll see what it weighs once it is out on the market. What I would really like would be a folding netbook, where the screen can actually fold or roll up so it takes up less room. Here's something coming up that begins to approach what I would like to see -

Nine E-Readers to Gawk At - Photo Essays - TIME

http://www.readius.com/

http://www.readius.com/pocket-ereader/rollable-displays

Of course, that's separate from touch tablet tech, too, so pardon my tangent, please.

 

[Umbran]

I know that having rules information or a character sheet available on a computer is a great boon for some. But honestly, that doesn't change the characteristics of play from using pencils, papers, and dead-tree editions. Faster, perhaps for some, but not fundamentally different.

When such devices become commonplace, and people start doing interesting things with networking them, then you might start seeing functionality that cannot be duplicated otherwise - games that are still tabletop, face-to-face games, but that have mechanics and functions that cannot happen without the devices.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I don't think it is about PDFs anymore for WotC. Until there is wireless access everywhere you play, these devices won't be as completely useful to tabletop gaming with DDI support as they could be (perhaps someone with a subscription could detail the non-wireless pros and cons of DDI these days?). People who game at gamestores need to keep lobbying their gamestore owners to invest in a wireless network for their patrons. Those who game at home and like DDI probably have set up home wireless access, I would think. For other companies who do sell their full product lines as PDFs, this will be a big boon. I know I have been looking forward to this type of technology to advance. Huzzah!

If the audience of WotC is beginning to adopt touch tablets and eReaders, WotC might revise its position on electronic rulebooks eventually. With more eReaders, there will also be more methods devised to include DRM that makes piracy harder. If it's not WotC that has to come up with their DRM system, it makes things a lot easier for them, too.

---

Interestingly, the first generation of tablet PCs were apparently not exactly a success. I suspect that price and performance are only now getting into areas where this type of technology has a good chance.

 

[nedjer]

I'd kind of assumed the iSlate and the MS Courier would make little difference, as they'd be 'premium' offerings with wireless subscriptions. On that level there'd never be enough of them to make much difference to distributing, sharing and playing tabletop games.

It's the Google plans, and a raft of others like Sony and Toshiba sitting in the wings, which maybe change the picture. A $300 tablet plugged into a household internet connection/ or 'pay as you go' is a 'shoe in' for parents equipping kids for school. Most of what players might want to do with tablets could then be done without on-going costs.

There's no need for full wireless to then carry around, distribute or share documents in a room. Bluetooth 2 isn't the best solution in the world but it'd give everyone wireless access as a GM distributes floorplans and documents, players pass messages and tablets around, and the rules are at everyone's fingertips.

Much as I love them, I can see hardbacks having a real problem competing with that even before more interactivity in pdfs and html versions of tabletop RPGs adds more features.

On the one hand this seems like a great leveller, as Indie publishers will be able to offer interactive pdfs, etc . . . which don't need to be printed or viewed on a chunky laptop to be useful.

On the other hand, it maybe means that tabletop RPGs are going to become desktop RPGs that are more like the AD&D MS Surface Demo that appeared last year. Which looked a bit too mechanistic for my tastes. i.e. the tablet was running the game, rather than the game/ players running the tablet.

. . . ?

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

BTW I wonder if the potential uses for tablet PC and eBooks for education have yet been fully realized.

Many Federal States in Germany provide pupils with education material in form of books and in higher classes even graphical calculators and stuff like that. But only a subset of each books content is actually used during a school year and even over the entire school "career". Having eReaders for the pupils with all education materials in digital form could be awesome! Especially since it also means that the pupils don't have to wear heavy satchels for all their books. (And boy, there were and are big and heavy books!) [/tangent]

 

[Mark]

With more eReaders, there will also be more methods devised to include DRM that makes piracy harder. If it's not WotC that has to come up with their DRM system, it makes things a lot easier for them, too.

DRM has been soundly rejected by gamers. WotC re-entering the pdf/ebook arena only to embrace DRM would likely be a waste of their efforts.

 

[Umbran]

With more eReaders, there will also be more methods devised to include DRM that makes piracy harder.

I have to agree with Mark, here. DRM as a control tactic seems to be going away - Apple taking DRM out of iTunes seems to be the big sign that DRM's time has passed.