Designing and evaluating the tabletop game experience for senior citizens

In this paper, we report on the design and evaluation of a tabletop game especially created for senior citizens. The game is intended to provide leisure and fun and is played with four players on anaugmented tabletop. It evolved from existing games and rules that are popular and familiar amongst senior citizens. Several aspects that are part of the gaming experience, such as immersion, flow, affect and, challenge, were assessed experimentally. The gaming experience was measured relatively by subjectively comparing user reactions across two sessions, one using a conventional board game and another using a digital tabletop version of the same game. Our results indicate that senior citizens found the tabletop version of the game to be more immersive and absorbing. We also discuss some implications to tabletop game design that can be deduced from the qualitative feedback provided by our participants.