Teburu could be the digital board game system that finally catches on

polygon.com:

After nearly two decades covering Gen Con, the world’s largest tabletop gaming convention, I’ve gotten pretty sick and tired of hearing about digitized board game tables and consoles.

Touch-sensitive screens, motion sensing cameras, RFID-enabled bits, AAA-licensed titles, virtual reality solutions… I’ve heard literally every pitch that’s been made in the last few years. The trouble is that nearly everyone hocking a digital board game console is selling an overpriced solution for a problem that doesn’t exist. There are plenty of great board games available right now, thank you, most of which I can get sent to my house overnight and none of which require a firmware update in order to run.

But what if there was a digital solution that was actually adding something to the experience, a nearly transparent digital platform that contributed to the immersion and speed of play? Earlier this month I was introduced to Teburu, a startup project by the experienced game developers at Xplored. I was skeptical at first, but if something does succeed in this fanciful little niche I think it could look an awful lot like Teburu.

At the center of the Teburu system is a rectangular game board, just about the same size as your average Monopoly board; it’s just that this one is covered on one side with a thin, pre-printed adhesive sheet full of sensors. A compatible board game goes on top. On the bottom of each of your pieces are RFID tags, which the game board can detect as they move across its surface. Attached to the game board is a dongle with two antennas — one that connects to the RFID chips and another for Bluetooth. That’s for the dice, two simple six-sided dice just smart enough to know which side is up, and for other