Scrabble, the family board game of which 350,000 copies are sold every year in France, just celebrated its 75th anniversary in April 2023. The most famous word game in the world is the subject of numerous tournaments, including a French championship. The French Federation of this game has more than 20,000 licensed players and, for decades, the success of this board game has not waned. It now comes in various versions, including "deluxe", "pocket" and for younger players under the name of "first Scrabble".
Scrabble in Numbers
Scrabble, which is a registered trademark, refers to a board game whose objective is to place words on a square grid of 225 squares (15 by 15), using a random draw of seven letters (out of the 102 letters included in the game box).
From this draw, 5040 combinations are possible. Different values are assigned to each letter of the alphabet and certain squares on the board allow this value to be multiplied, the goal of the game being naturally to score as many points as possible.
The game is marketed in 121 countries and in 35 languages. There are 8 different versions and more than 100 million boxes have been sold worldwide since its creation. The rights owner is Hasbro in the United States and Canada and Mattel in the rest of the world.
History of Scrabble
Scrabble was born from the imagination of New York architect Alfred Butts. Constrained by unemployment due to the 1929 crisis, he launched a first version of the game, called Lexiko, as early as 1931. However, Scrabble did not become a registered trademark until 1948, as Alfred Butts struggled to make his game known and commercialize it.
The current game board grid dates back to 1938, but it was not until 1952 that the game became a real success, thanks to James Brunot, one of the owners of Macy's, the largest store in New York. From 8,500 copies sold in 1951, sales took off to more than 4.5 million copies by the end of 1954.
Other countries (Canada, Australia and Great Britain in particular) got into the game, which arrived in France in 1955. Again, success was not immediate and it was not until 1965 that the game became popular through the Club Med, where vacationers were invited to play.
The rules of the game.
The Scrabble board is a square grid, with certain colored squares, called "multiplier squares", that increase the value of the letter or word placed on them.
Among the tiles, E is the most frequent (with 15 occurrences), but is only worth one point, while the expensive letters J, K, Q, W, X, Y and Z are represented only once but are worth 8 points (J and Q) or 10 points (K, W, X, Y and Z).
The player who manages to place their 7 letters in a single word receives a bonus of 50 points. This is called making a Scrabble or scrabbling.
To score as many points as possible, players try to place their word on "triple word score" and "double word score" squares whenever they are accessible, with the difficulty increasing as the grid fills up.
The first word must pass through the center square, which is distinguished by a star, and subsequent words must be based on words already placed. It is possible to place a word by attaching it to another word already present on the grid: this is called building.
The words played must appear in the current edition of The Official Scrabble Players Dictionary.
"The Official Scrabble Handbook"
The authorized vocabulary is generally a source of discord among amateur players, which inspired a famous sketch by comedian Pierre Palmade. That's why French Scrabble players now have a reference dictionary: L'Officiel du Scrabble (ODS).
This dictionary contains 60,894 entries (excluding plurals, feminine forms, and conjugated verbs). It includes words from common dictionaries, such as Larousse and Robert, as well as many words from Belgium, Switzerland, Quebec, and African countries.
In the 2004 edition, 369,085 words are accepted, including 75 two-letter words, 571 three-letter words, 2,364 four-letter words, 7,277 five-letter words, 16,622 six-letter words, 29,996 seven-letter words, and 44,664 eight-letter words.
The variations of the game.
The classic way of playing involves 2 to 4 players taking turns to place a word. In most countries, competitions are organized as single matches, one on one, as in chess tournaments.
In 1970, the Belgian Hippolyte Wouters imagined a variant of the game called duplicate which allows the simultaneous participation of several hundred players. Each player has a grid common to all players and searches for all possible moves on draws imposed by an arbitrator. After a determined time, from one to three minutes, he writes a response bulletin.
Arbitration is now done electronically, with software providing the optimal solution instantly. The best solution is announced by the arbitrator and placed on the common grid, where it serves as the starting point for the next round. The overall ranking is established by adding up the scores obtained.
The widespread use of the Internet also allows for simultaneous games in multiple locations. Even in the era of the web and online games, Scrabble has not yet had its last word!