Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I'm a longtime Scrabble fan, and a member of the National Scrabble Association, and I've played at clubs and in a couple of tournaments. I'm a bit of a Scrabble collector, and I am kind of obsessed with finding the perfect Scrabble board! This is a really good board for everyday play or for taking with you to play at a friend's house. It's a very elegant design, with many improvements over previous versions, and I like it a lot. But still, it is not quite perfect.
Let's start with the good points:
It folds in half, so it takes much less storage space than previous versions, and there's no cardboard box to get ruined. And the fold is on one of the grid lines, not right through the center of the center column, so it doesn't hurt the aesthetic. The closure is a hidden magnet, which is pretty sleek. And there's even a handle for easy carrying. All the tiles and racks fit into the two slide out trays, so you don't have to worry about pieces falling out when you open the board. There's no clear plastic grid covering the board like the 50th anniversary set and other previous editions, which is great, because I always had a problem with glare on those versions. But there's still a raised grid to keep the letters in place. The entire board rotates on wheels on the bottom of the board, and the wheels are wisely aligned to force it to rotate about a fixed point, instead of rolling all over the table.
I only have a few complaints that prevent me from giving it 5 stars:
1.) They changed the color scheme of the board! They switched the double word and triple word colors, and the triple letter is now lime green instead of dark blue. I guess it doesn't matter that much, but I don't like them messing with tradition in this case, especially on an Anniversary edition board. It just doesn't feel like an official Scrabble board if the colors aren't right. In fact, I probably wouldn't use this board at a club or tournament, just because the color scheme makes it look more like a kid's toy than a serious adult game. I sure hope they go back to the traditional colors on future editions.
2.) The racks are curved - I'm not sure if this is good or bad yet, but I don't really see the advantage to it, and I think it will take some getting used to. The tiles still seem to slide ok on the rack.
3.) The instruction book is just barely too wide to fit in the drawers without bending. Of course I'll never need to use the instruction book, but it seems likely to get ruined this way, and it would be nice to keep everything in good shape. I don't see why they couldn't have made it 1/4" narrower so it fits neatly in the drawer.
4.) Even with the curved edges, the board will still hit your rack when it rotates if you're not careful (but it doesn't knock your letters off your rack, which is good). A completely circular board would be ideal.
5.) The list of 2-letter words in the instruction book is not up to date with the 4th edition word list (QI and ZA are missing), even though it was printed in 2008! Again, experienced players will never look at the instruction book, but that's not good for new players, and it's kind of a suprising oversight.
Most of these complaints are pretty minor. Overall, I'm very pleased with this board, and it seems to me they are one step closer to designing the perfect board!
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