This idea is probably already baked--being just a slight variant of another product. But I haven't see this done anywhere else.
Already baked: A board game with a raised grid to keep the playing pieces from sliding around - a travel Scrabble set is a good example.
Half-baked part: Instead of
a rigid grid molded into the board, make it from flexible cord or wire stretched over the board's surface.
Why? In some games (like Scrabble), you sometimes want to look under a playing piece to confirm what color the square is. With the flexible grid you can just slide the piece to the side a little to look, and when you let go it springs back into place by itself.
I made a board like this to replace a broken one from a set I'd had for a long time. I used thin piece of wood and cut small notches in the edges to string the "grid" across it -- just because it was the easiest thing to do with materials on hand. But it looks kinda neat and works better than I expected.
Trivial, I know -- but already baked? Other examples somewhere?