Dungeons & Dragons x Microsoft Surface

By Peter Ha | October 20, 2009 | +

Your DM commands you to watch this video or perish in the swamp to the east of the bog that’s west of the cottage.

I’ve clearly never played D&D, but this proof of concept from the team at Carnegie Mellon shows exactly what the Surface was made for since it hasn’t amounted to anything else. Let’s all keep our fingers crossed and hope the Courier is real. For those of us in the NE, we may see Surfacescapes at PAX East in March. A nerd can dream.

(via CrunchGear)

Related Topics: d&d, dungeons and dragons, surface, Gaming & Culture, Microsoft, Web Video

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http://youtube.com/churchhatestucker Church

You’ve never played D&D? *makes tick on clipboard*
dennitzio

Hm. You only have a couple of other options to prove you are a geek and not merely a computer nerd… I hope you’ve at least played Magic, the Gathering or read LOTR at least 8 times. Even watching shows like BSG or Firefly would help, though watching Star Trek/Star Wars doesn’t, except for fan films, which do.
http://twitter.com/thepeterha Peter Ha

Fine. I’ll watch the first two seasons of BSG this weekend and report back.
omahalawyer

I like the PoC. I want to apply it to other RPGs, and tap into a collaborative Web interface that works with non-Surface interfaces. (GM from afar with Surface, use Web-sharing service (free or proprietary) to get together with gaming friends across the multiverse, um, I mean, world.

They need to create dice with some sort of gyroscopic, wireless dice. The tactile nature of the roll is part of the thrill.
omahalawyer

I was typing in three different boxes at the same time. There’s multitasking for you.

I still think the wireless enabled, gyroscopic dice idea is nifty. However, I would have preferred to have utilized proofreading and grammar rather than sounding like a redundant hoo-ha.
nedlum

Or alternatively, just uses normal dice, and then enter it in. Or… Can’t the surface see what the bottom of the die looks like, and extrapolate
omahalawyer

But then the dice would be neither gyroscopic nor wireless. What’s the point in that? (It would be interesting as to whether the screen could identify the number on the bottom of a die rolled on the surface. I know that there exist security applications for the iPhone that purport to do biometric scans and comparisons of fingerprints, I don’t know (1) if they are actually doing so on the multitouch surface, or (2) if the capability could be extended to scan the bottom of the die, which is smaller, and of which the user would probably not be actively pressing down on the surface for scanning purposes. High contrast dice would probably help…)
http://youtube.com/churchhatestucker Church

The dice rolling machine uses colored pips to help with scanning:
http://gamesbyemail.com/News/DiceOMatic
http://techland.com/2010/06/21/settlers-of-catan-in-development-for-microsoft-surface-machines/ Settlers of Catan in Development for Microsoft Surface Machines – Techland – TIME.com

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