As a side note to the conversation, I am pretty much convinced that as surface computing makes its way into our homes and lives there will be a resurgence of interest in playing table-top games.

All the pros of a real boardgame (social interaction face to face) but none of the cons (lost pieces, bent cards, misprinted rules etc).

So the time is ripe for a great development tool.

good point -- it needs to be able to let you play-test it as a single developer, with two windows, one for each player, showing that player's view.

-Mouser

Not just two windows, I think it must cater for games of any reasonable number - certainly up to 5 or 6.

In brief: Yes! this would be hugely useful.

I have tinkered with Zuntzu, but found the creation process more laboured than it should be, plus in the early stages of design I don't want to playtest with other people in a multi-player environment, but rather on my own, since the game will no doubt be dismal in its early incarnations!

Will try to respond more fully later on, when I have time to read the original post in full.

A bit more…

I don't find Zuntzu very intuitive to use, but there are some useful features…

• The tray for holding a hand of cards
  
• The ability to stack cards / tiles / counters
  
• Rotation of pieces / cards
  
• Flipping of pieces / cards

I guess I'd be looking for a system that had all these things and more, but with less emphasis on good looks (functional and clear is all that is required) and it must be quick to change.

Although adding a ruleset is not a necessity it might be nice (limit the hand size to 5 for example)… And consider the power of a system that gathered statistics as you play-tested, especially if this was recorded along with the ruleset…

eg: Game turns = 23, Winning Score = 102, Handsize Limit = 5 etc etc.