English

Tatami Maker: A combinatorially rich mechanical game board

Combinatorics 2013-03-19 v2 Computational Geometry

Abstract

Japanese tatami mats are often arranged so that no four mats meet. This local restriction imposes a rich combinatorial structure when applied to monomino-domino coverings of rectilinear grids. We describe a modular, mechanical game board, prototyped with a desktop 3D printer, that enforces this restriction, and transforms tatami pen-and- paper puzzles into interactive sculptures. We review some recent mathematical discoveries on tatami coverings and present five new combinatorial games implemented on the game board.

Cite

@article{arxiv.1301.5969,
  title  = {Tatami Maker: A combinatorially rich mechanical game board},
  author = {Alejandro Erickson},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1301.5969},
  year   = {2013}
}

Comments

8 pages, Accepted at Bridges Conference 2013

R2 v1 2026-06-21T23:15:08.041Z