Fun and Games on your E-Ink Tablet
E-Ink tablets are generally perceived as buttoned-up productivity devices– notetaking, planning, and reading are their primary use cases. However, they can also be used for a range of games and other leisurely pursuits. In this post, we’ll look at some of the best ways to unwind on your reMarkable, Kindle Scribe, or Supernote, while preserving the calm, distraction-free experience that makes them unique.
Sudoku, crosswords, and puzzles
When people think of games on e-Ink, Sudoku and crosswords are probably the first things that come to mind. With a paperlike surface, pen, and near-infinite document storage, these tablets are ideal for pulling up a puzzle for a quick break.
Krazydad is by far my favourite resource for puzzles. In addition to classics like Sudoku and Inky, each available at a range of difficulty levels, he has many other unique puzzles available for download. The Star Battles in particular are very fun, and work perfectly on e-Ink. While his site has many free downloads available, it's worth supporting his work by purchasing some of the tablet-optimized, linked PDF files available from his Etsy shop.
Roll and Writes
The last decade in board gaming has seen the rise of “Roll and Writes”- where you roll some dice that allow you to take certain actions with a pen on a game sheet. Two classics from this genre that I've enjoyed on my reMarkable are That’s Pretty Clever (despite its emphasis on color) and Railroad Ink. Both games work well if you have their custom dice at hand, once you’ve uploaded a picture of the game sheet to the tablet. Playing digitally is a great workaround for the annoyingly short-lived markers each game ships with.
There are many similar games that don't rely on custom dice — any regular 6-sided dice will do. Yahtzee is probably the most famous, and you can find unofficial game sheets online (I won't link to them here because Hasbro is famously litigious). There are also a wide range of indie roll-and-write creations available for purchase at PnpArcade. I haven't tried these out yet but they look to be worth exploring.
My favourite purveyor of Roll and Writes so far is Postmark Games. All of their games are available, at a reasonable cost, as PDFs you can load on your tablet. Add a couple of 6-sided dice and you're ready to play. Postmark's production value is very high, and each game includes several maps/levels, so there is a lot of variety on offer. Voyages and Waypoints have been my favourites so far, while Battle Card was a bit of a miss in my opinion. Postmark has just wrapped up a Kickstarter for their latest game, Koala Rescue Club, which I look forward to trying out next.
TTRPG
At last we come to what many would consider to be the apex of pen-and-paper gaming. E-Ink tablets are wonderful tools to enhance tabletop roleplaying games (TTRPG), whether it be D&D, Pathfinder, or one of the many other systems springing up in recent years (I'm keeping an eye on DC20).
While filling out PDF character sheets on a tablet is a natural fit for players, I'm particularly interested in how e-Ink tablets can ease the complex job of running a game, while retaining its low-tech feel. I don't know of any e-Ink specific tools for this yet, but so far I've had success adapting a version of my planner without date pages, and with collections for all of the things a DM needs to manage and remember (Characters, Sessions, NPCs, Locations, Items, etc). Nearly two years after my campaign's first session, it's wonderful to have structured notes in a single file (backed up), to help recall details for each character and session.
Other games and resources
While the above options are the ones I've enjoyed most on my tablets, there are many other possibilities, particularly if you expand beyond pen-based games:
- e-ink.club is a website with some classic games you can play in-browser. It feels surreal to play 2048 on a Kindle Scribe, but it works!
- There is a /r/einkgames subreddit devoted to games that work well on e-Ink (many of which are Android apps)
- A redditor came up with a genius way to play Battleship with pen input on the reMarkbale, even using the folio as a wall to divide the screen between players.
I hope this post has given you at least one idea to expand your tablet's potential beyond work and productivity. E-Ink tablets can be not just practical, but also fun!