kittenscribble | Mar. 6th, 2008

I'm sure it's been said already, but while Hasbro scrambles to get a piece of the Scrabulous pie, I'd like to point out that Scrabulous isn't hurting Hasbro at all. They're aimed at different groups of users. I'm an avid Scrabulous player, but most of the online games I play are long-distance. I have games going with my cousins in Denver and Toronto, for instance, and with friends in New York. It would be kind of difficult to play those games with an actual board.

Well, okay, I also have games going with my roommates; I suppose Hasbro would get its knickers in a twist about that. But if we really wanted to bring out a board, we could; I have two Scrabble sets at home (one's a portable set, for road trips).

I love Scrabble, really. We used to play all the time when I was a kid, the board sitting off to one side of the family room while Dad and Mui and I took our sweet time over each turn. Sometimes games would last for days. We still drag out a board during family get-togethers.

(I never really saw the fuss about "cheating" with the dictionary; the Official Scrabble Dictionary often sat right by the board while we played. The house rule was that if we could find the word in the dictionary, and recite the definition for skeptical opponents, then the word was fair. Mom even wrote musical notes on the inside cover, to pump up the list of two-letter words -- not just do re mi, but a solfege scale including the in-between notes: dol, di, ra, re, ri, me, mi, etc. The online anagram generators, though -- that's cheating. Gotta draw the line somewhere.)