                          A BRIEF HISTORY OF SCRABBLE

          
                                       i
                          The Scrabble (tm) Word Game

The Scrabble (tm) word game has its origins in the depths of the Great 
Depression. Alfred Butts, an unemployed architect in upstate New York, had 
time on his hands. It was 1931, and his career prospects were understandably 
dim. What better thing to do than to try to invent a new board game? 

Butts attempted to combine the elements of anagramming and crossword puzzle 
solving in his new game.  Skill would predominate, but random chance would 
also play a part.  He called it Criss Cross.

Butts made Criss Cross sets by hand for friends, who received it with 
enthusiasm, and sent samples to game manufacturers, who ignored it.  By then 
architects were again in demand, and he returned to the practice of his 
profession.

By 1948, Butts was willing to give up manufacturing rights to family friends, 
James Brunot and his wife.  The Brunots revised the game and changed its name 
to the now familiar Scrabble (tm).  The game's popularity grew steadily over 
the next few years, but it was still not a money maker.  Finally, Brunot 
managed to consign some sets to the Macy's department store in 1952.  Macy's 
featured the game and the orders began to pour in.  Brunot's small company 
could no longer keep up with the demand and he assigned marketing and 
distribution rights to the Selchow and Righter Company.

During the 1950's, Scrabble (tm) became a national mania, being featured in 
the media and becoming the family game of choice.  Its popularity continued 
on a gradual upward curve into the '60's and '70's.  The last decade has seen 
something of a decline in Scrabble's (tm) fortunes as the younger generation 
has taken to video and computer games.  Scrabble (tm) remains, however, the 
premier board game, a synergistic blend of letter pattern combinations and 
geometric abstraction. It is about building words from random letter 
combinations, bringing forth order from chaos, and it is about conquering 
time and space. It is one of those rare games that allows its players to 
take part in a magic ritual for just a little while. If all the conditions 
are right, it can be a mystic experience.

A few years ago, Selchow and Righter sold all rights to Scrabble (tm) and 
derivative products to Coleco. Coleco went bankrupt shortly afterwards 
(though not as a result of Scrabble (tm), which continued to sell steadily). 
Milton Bradley, a subsidiary of Hasbro, acquired the rights and still owns 
them to this day. Milton Bradley is making some efforts to revive the 
popularity of the game, and is attempting to introduce it into schools as an 
educational device. The large cash prizes at national tournaments ($50,000 at 
the Las Vegas nationals) that generated notice in the news media were put up 
by Milton Bradley.

There are a few thousand of "serious" players, that is, NSA members, rated 
players, and tournament participants. The popular base of Scrabble (tm) is 
the tens of millions of occasional and casual players. It remains to be seen 
whether a) the number of casual players will increase, and b) the migration 
of casual players to serious players can be encouraged. 


The 3rd edition of the OSPD (tm) is valid for play as of the beginning of 
February, 1996. There has also been an expurgated edition released, missing 
all those nasty words and insults, but all the expurgated words are still 
valid in competitive tournament play. The file OSPD.NEW contains the words 
newly added to the 3rd edition. The dictionary committee of the NSA is 
reportedly working on yet another OSPD (tm) update, to be ready sometime in 
the spring of 1997.

            

                                     ii
                      Computer Versions of Scrabble (tm)

The first generation of personal computers was scarcely powerful enough to 
support as complex a game as Scrabble (tm).  The Commodore Pet, TRS-80 Model 
I, OSI Challenger, and early Apple II typically had between 4K and 16K of 
memory, cassette tape storage, and limited graphics. The main programming 
language available, BASIC, was hardly suitable for anything but fairly 
simple games. This was to change quickly. 

In its April 1980 issue, CREATIVE COMPUTING magazine published a listing of 
"Perquackey" written in DISK BASIC for the TRS-80 Model I, by David E. 
Powers. This text-based game had much of the feel of Scrabble (tm) and 
hinted at greater possibilities. This version of computer Perquackey was 
very playable and did not produce boredom unless played to excess (more than 
5 hours at a time). 

In its December 1981 issue, BYTE Magazine featured a version of Scrabble 
(tm) written by Joseph Roehrig in generic MBASIC in the annual games award 
issue. After spending many hours typing in the long listing into my 16K 
"Trash 80", I was rewarded with a very crude and slow simulation of what I 
barely recognized as Scrabble (tm). Disappointing. 

The big breakthrough came in May of 1981. Personal Software Inc. released 
Monty Plays Scrabble (r) for the disk-based 48K Apple II. The graphics were 
low resolution (it did *not* use the Apple's hires mode and it was actually 
necessary to keep track of play on a game board), the game play was s-l-o-w 
at the higher levels, and that little disk drive kept grinding away as 
"Monty" looked up words to play (with his silly looking face staring out 
from the computer screen). All the same, "Monty" played a remarkably strong 
game, averaging about 350 points per game at the top level and scoring about 
a Bingo per game. This was an astonishing achievement for that generation of 
computer hardware. Sadly, the handheld electronic version of "Monty" was a 
disappointing failure. 

The advent of the more powerful IBM PC brought more sophistication to games. 
Virgin Games brought out its version of Scrabble (tm) in the late '80's. It 
played almost as strong a game as "Monty", and the graphics were somewhat 
better.  Around 1990, Virgin Games released Deluxe Scrabble (tm), for PC 
compatibles with hard drive, mouse, and a VGA monitor. The graphics were 
greatly improved, the game play was strong, averaging maybe 380 points per 
game on the highest playing level, and the game playing interface the best 
so far. After 10 years, Monty was finally beaten. 

Virgin Games Deluxe Scrabble (tm), was issued on CD ROM, and cost in the 
neighborhood of $35 (discounted considerably at computer flea markets, if 
you can still find it). It provides good practice for game play against 
humans, especially in its timed mode. It has many extra options and features 
as a bonus. The user interface still compares very favorably with any of the 
more modern computerized Scrabble (tm) implementations. The word list is 
only OSPD1 compatible with about 200 errors in it and not upgradeable. No 
longer available at retail, but still turns up at computer flea markets. I 
still recommend this one because of its playability, and with more modern 
computers it can be played at the top level without having to wait overly 
long for the computer to move. Can run under DOS, which speeds things up 
considerably. 

In late 1987, Vic Rice wrote a freeware Scrabble (tm) program using EGA 
graphics.  It is difficult to set it up to run on newer computers with 
extended memory, but it plays an interesting game.  No current address for 
him is available (his Seabrook, Texas address is no longer valid).

In early 1988, Chris Hall, now of Irving, Texas programmed a simple version 
of Scrabble (tm) and released it as freeware. It allows human players to use 
the computer as a surrogate for the game board and pieces when competing 
against each other. There is *no* computer opponent. This is an interesting 
and useful program. It may still be available for download from some BBS's 
(check his home page also, see below). 
Chris also has produced Scrabble (tm) door software for BBS's.
Chris Hall's address is:
       PO Box 165507
       Irving, TX  75016-5507
       e-mail: chall@nova-net.net
       Web:    http://www.nova1.net/~chall/


There is a very good shareware version of Scrabble (tm) available, called 
Scramble. It can be downloaded from many BBS's and is offered by some 
shareware distributors. Scramble has a very intuitive player interface, 
superior even to that of Virgin Games' commercial version. The graphics are 
only adequate, its dictionary is very limited, and important features such 
as a save-game option and a game timer are missing. Still, at $15 to 
register it is a bargain and highly recommended. Scramble may be ordered 
directly from: 
                                      Diana Gruber
                                      Ted Gruber Software
                                      PO Box 13408
                                      Las Vegas, NV 89112.



Scrabell is a simple but elegant freeware version of Scrabble (tm). No 
computer opponent is provided, though there is a word check against the 
supplied 35,000 word dictionary. The VGA graphics are adequate, actually 
very similar to Scramble, above, as is the mouse interface. The entire game 
requires only 400K of drive space so it is eminently suitable for older 
systems or laptops. The author will accept, but does not require, a $5.00 
contribution.  An enhanced, Windows compatible version is reportedly 
forthcoming.
                                      John M. Sharpe
                                      9502 N. 15th Ave., #224
                                      Phoenix, AZ 85021
                                      E-mail: jmsharpe@aol.com


An excellent shareware Scrabble (tm) game, for Windows users, is the new and 
improved Networdz, by Lance Frohman. It carries a low $12 registration, and 
Lance will supply extra dictionaries, including foreign language ones, to 
registered users. You can download Networdz from his Web page. Networdz has 
enhanced support for play by modem over the Internet. 
                    Lance Frohman
                    2035 Filbert St., #2
                    San Francisco, CA 94123-3539
                    E-mail: lfrohman@sirius.com
                    Web: http://www.sirius.com/~lfrohman/sharware.html

Tim & Glo's Scrabble (tm) Parlor offers IRC and chat support for Networdz at 
the website http://www.cris.com/~Tjdavis/.



For all you UNIX devotees and programmers, there is James Cherry's freeware 
UNIX SCRABBLE. It is supplied as a half meg "tarred" file at the ftp site 
ftp.doe.carleton.ca in the /pub/scrabble directory. This one is not for the 
faint of heart. The source code in C is supplied, and it compiles without 
problems with gcc under Linux. Plays a fast and very strong game using a 
supplied OSPD2-compatible 87,995 word dictionary (substituting your own 
dictionary is not too difficult, and an OSPD3-compatible dictionary for this 
game is available from M\Cooper, see below). If only it had graphics and a 
nicer user interface (running under X maybe), it would be s-l-i-c-k. Compare 
this one against Matt Chapman's XScrabble, below.



Another UNIX version is Matt Chapman's XScrabble. This one has a very nice 
GUI user interface, and runs in an Xterm. Pretty looking (uses Tk widgets), 
plays a good game, and has more "bells and whistles" than is usual for 
Scrabble (tm) software, including game timer, auto save of high turn and 
game scores, and more. Unfortunately, game play is slow, especially at 
higher levels. Uses supplied OSPD2 dictionary which can be upgraded by user. 
As is usual for UNIX software, the source code needs to be "built" (requires 
a fair amount of UNIX expertise). One of the Makefiles needs to be tweaked 
for it to compile on a Linux box (contact M\Cooper for the patch). It is a 
Beta version, so it still has a few minor bugs. There may soon be a support 
group for this software, according to Matt. Very highly recommended, 
nonetheless (it is gratifying to see software that runs on a *real* 
multitasking OS). 
                     It is available for download at: 
        http://www.csv.warwick.ac.uk/~csuoq/programs/xscrabble.tar.gz
              The author of the software can be e-mailed at :
                          csuoq@csv.warwick.ac.uk



Then there is Wordsworth. This shareware game is a mind-blowing new approach 
to computer Scrabble (tm). It eliminates the some of the limitations in 
classic Scrabble (tm) by allowing the player to configure the shape of the 
board and even to choose the letter distribution. The graphics in the 
highest resolution mode are a bit hard on the eyes and the dictionary could 
be larger (15,000 words in the unregistered version, entire OSPD2 in the 
registered), but all the same this is a noble attempt to breathe some life 
back into this venerable game. Also has a number of subsidiary anagram and 
pattern matching utilities. Highly recommended, even if a bit pricey. Costs 
$25 U.S. (75 Rand South African) to register. May be ordered directly from: 
                                       Graham Wheeler
                                       P.O. Box 6680
                                       Roggebaai
                                       Capetown 8012
                                       South Africa
                                       ==============
                                       Email: gram@oms.co.za


The strongest commercial version of Scrabble (tm) is reputed to be 
CrossWise. It costs $35 + shipping and is available from Cygnus Cybernetics, 
2013 Weathertop, Ft. Collins, CO 80526. Runs on PC Compatibles only and is 
unfortunately copy protected [I strongly advise against purchase of copy 
protected software].            ========


Milton Bradley has released "official" Scrabble (tm) software for MS Windows 
(tm) and the Mac, available on CD ROM. It retails for about $50 at your 
local toy or computer software store. M.B. purchased rights to Maven and 
incorporated its algorithms into its own product, but it lacks some of the 
features of its predecessor. 



Scrabble and OSPD are trademarks of the Milton Bradley Co., Inc.

Monty Plays Scrabble was trademarked and copyrighted by Personal Software.

MS Windows (tm) is a trademark of the Microsoft Corp.



                                Comments:


                                M\Cooper
                               PO Box 237
                       St. David, AZ 85630-0237
             ------------------------------------------------
                     E-mail: thegrendel@theriver.com
             Web: http://personal.riverusers.com/~thegrendel/
