Cyber Max

Invented and designed by Alfred Butts during the great depression and originally known as “Criss-Cross Words”, Scrabble was renamed into the board game we know today in 1948.

Today, Scrabble is not merely just a board game. It is an internationally competitive “mind sport” with an active competitive circuit, Scrabble Clubs, National Associations and World Championships.

Growth of Scrabble Clubs across the globe continues each year and the standard of competition grows along with it. As a mind sport, Scrabble is quickly approaching the level of intellectual challenge and respect that is held by other mind-sports such as Chess.

The growing popularity of Scrabble today defies the myriad of similar rival word-based board games that have emerged over the past two decades.

Successful Scrabble players know that there is far more to this game than just spelling and vocabulary skills. Scrabble is a mind sport, requiring mathematical skills, analytical and strategic skills, and a mild dose of luck.

To the recreational Scrabble player who enjoys a game with the family over the kitchen table, the lack (or bad luck) of drawing the best (or worst) collection of tiles out of the bag is a major component of whether a player wins or loses. The more advanced and competitive the player, the less luck plays a part. Strategic skills largely eliminate the luck component.

There are several reasons why Scrabble is growing in popularity year by year.

In earlier eras, there were problems with different dictionaries allowing or disallowing various words. Today, Official Scrabble Dictionaries have been almost totally standardized internationally for English language play. There are now just two slightly differing sets of official words - one for North America and another for the rest of the world.

The Scrabble Clubs themselves generate publicity in their communities, offering not just competition, but also a social scene for the less serious yet still enthusiastic recreational player.

Inter-club tournaments, Nation Championships and World Championships draw major media attention.

Even ESPN has trialed televising Scrabble competitions and is believed to be keen on expanding their coverage of Scrabble as a competitive mind sport.

In several countries, Scrabble Clubs and associations are working actively with Government Education Departments to introduce “School Scrabble” - combining the academic and the sporting aspects of Scrabble into the school curriculum.

The internet is playing a role in the growing popularity of Scrabble with numerous websites available for playing Scrabble online. Educational resources and advice from Scrabble experts is also readily available online.

The future growth of Scrabble internationally appears assured. Given that the International Olympic Committee is now considering a number of mind-sports, such as Bridge, for possible inclusion in future Olympic Games, it is not beyond the realms of possibility that at some future point in time Scrabble itself may become an Olympic sport.

Trevor Johnson is the author of the highly acclaimed “Scrabble Bonus Word Techniques” e-book series, available at http://www.bonuswords.com.

Scrabble

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I come from a family of golfers. Golf is the favorite recreation of everyone in my family, including my grandparents, my mom and dad, myself and my four siblings. Every year, we have a family reunion of sorts featuring all my relatives from my father’s side. At those gathering, the entire clan always has a sportsfest wherein each of the different families take on one another in four key sports. We always win the golf competition. The others are volleyball, ping pong and chess.

My dad told me to study chess for next year’s family sportsfest. I complained a lot at the beginning but have grown quite fond of the game. I often like to recite the history of the game to my friends and, actually, to anyone willing to listen.

Like the game of golf, chess also has a number of fathers as many countries claim to have originated the game. This has some basis especially if you note that the Arabic, Persian, Greek, Portuguese and Spanish words for chess are all derived from the Sanskrit game Chaturanga. You might also want to consider the fact that among all countries, only India had three animals in its cavalry — the horse, camel and elephant. In chess, these are believed to be represented by the knight, bishop and rook.

In addition, in the past only India had all three animals, horse, camel and elephant, in its cavalry, which represent knight, bishop and rook in chess. Also, there are a lot of similarities between the way chess is played today and the way Chaturanga was played in India during the 6th century. Historians believe the Persians later created a more popular version of the game and called it Shatranj. But there is yet another theory that claims that chess started from a game called Xiangqi that traces its roots to China during the 2nd century. there are a number of well-known scholars and historians who support the latter theory.

Eventually, the popularity of chess caught on in the west particularly in Europe as well as to the east particularly in Japan. Chess also started to spread throughout the world of Islam following the Muslim’s conquest of Persia. After some time, chess found its way to Russia (via Mongolia) where people started playing it in the 7th century. In the 10th century, the Moors introduced chess into the Iberian Peninsula as mentioned in a popular 13th century manuscript that also covered backgammon and dice, which was referred to as the Libro de los juegos. Historians say that the entry of chess into Europe is characterized by the enhancement of the queen’s powers.

Kadence Buchanan writes articles on many topics including
Recreation, Food, and Boating

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