It’s time for one the most classic games of them all, it’s time to review the board game Scrabble!
You probably already heard about it. You have a board with squares and some letters. Make words with what you have and place it on the board connecting with other words (like a crossword game). Your points will be the sum of each letter plus any applicable multiplier you can find on the board.
Product Details [line]
Name: Scrabble
Creator: Alfred Mosher Butts
Publisher: Hasbro
Year Published: 1948 (Originally)
Category: Word
Number of Players: 2 – 4
Age: 8 and above
Play Time: 45 – 90 minutes
Learning Difficulty: Easy
Game Rules: Click here
Best Price: Check at Amazon
Components [line]
The components quality and material of Scrabble greatly varies accordingly with the edition, year published and country you bought it. Usually the rule is a thin board where you place your letters and very good durable plastic letters to be played. The racks you use to keep your letters are made of the same material and nicely attend its purpose.
One of the things I always like in a board game is when it has a pouch where you can keep some items in case you have to draw it, and Scrabble has one to keep the letters mixed and secret.
The finishing of the letters seems to be very durable as I never notice any lost of paint in the letters name, which looks impressive as you are always mixing the letters with each other and causing them to colide with each other.
Due to its success, Scrabble can be found all over the world and different languages. Each language has a different numbers of repeated letters and the points vary to adapt it correctly to that reality.
Game Experience [line]
Some people prefer playing Scrabble with only 2 people. I prefer to play it with 4 as you have more places to connect your own words and sometimes people just getting in your using placing a word where you were planing playing yours. It makes the game more fun, but I still play it with only 2 people as sometimes you just want to chill and don’t have a bigger group of people at hand.
Your goal here is to make as much points as you can. Each letter has a number assigned to it. Every time you play a word, you sum your letter points and take note. Some squares in the board grid has special multipliers such as double your letter points or triple your word points. So it’s obviously not just about playing words, but you need a bit of strategy to be able to get the most of your words and the special points.
If at any point you manage to use your 7 letters to form a word, you get a huge 50 bonus, which makes it more interesting.
The game finishes when there’s no more letters left in the pouch and uses all of its own letters or when everyone passes or change letters 2 times.
When I play it, everyone is usually very quiet and concentrating in form their own words while other player is thinking/playing. I usually don’t play with restricted time, but always try to play as fast as possible.
Some people think Scrabble as a boring board game as it’s not as dynamic as other board games can be (for example Ticket to Ride). But I do recommend it for people that like to test their language skills, children that already have a small vocabulary and even English students that need to remember the new words they’re learning and build their vocabulary.
Interested? Buy it or read more reviews at Amazon.
I’ve not being tracking my high score in Scrabble as I have in other games, but my high score, as far as I can remember, is 257. Not incredibly high, but good enough. 😉
10 Comments
I love scrabble! This is an excellent review of the game and the point you made about it being helpful for children and people working on their English is very true I never thought of using it as a tool for my kids, thankyou!
Hi Alicia,
Thanks for your comment. It’s really a tool for much more than just entertainment. Try it and you’ll see your kids improving their vocabulary.
I love scrabble!
It’s one of the only board games I still play.
The way we play it you don’t pick letters from the pouch each time, but we rather spread them all on the table, with their face down, and every time someone finishes his batch, we just pick 7 new letters. I feel that having the letters spread out on the table, makes it more engaging to play 🙂
What’s good in Scrabble is that everyone can change the rules a bit to make it more fun.
I’ll give it a try and play the same way as you do to see how it goes.
Thanks.
Wow! what an awesome review 🙂 Like you’ve stated, I always thought that Scrabble was a boring board game but now I am so keen to play with my girlfriend and family! Thanks
That’s great to hear! Thank you for your words and have fun. 🙂
I love scrabble…even if I am useless at it…lol. Its awesome to see an old board game being promoted. Its a great fun game and educational at the same time. Great review my friend.
Some old board games should never be forgotten. They’re jewels in the board game industry and still very up to date with our kids.
my favorite game 🙂 usually a love board games but monopoly and scrabble are my favorites:) love this site 🙂 fun and information 🙂 thank you .
I’m glad you liked it 🙂 I also love Scrabble. It’s one of my favourites.