Travel Scrabble

To the reviewer who said that there is no scoring system, I draw their attention to the markers on the sides of the board (visible in the photo above) - you simply slide the counter to indicate the number of points you have - i.e. 'x' no. of 1's, 10's, 100's.

When not in use, the letters fit in a tray which slots neatly inside the board, and the handy storage bag doubles as the letters bag when play is in progress. The attention to detail on this product as A1.

We travelled the world for two years and this game was invaluable for whiling away long flights or just relaxing in the evenings...word of advice though - buy the official Scrabble words book, or fast-track yourself into a divorce situation!!!


Don't get normal Scrabble...   November 26, 2003
 61 out of 66 found this review helpful

Everyone knows Scrabble. This toys mistake is that it calls itself Travel Scrabble. It's not just for travelling. It should be called "letters that stay on the space they started on Scrabble". There's just no point getting the original version when it takes just one knock to redistribute every letter over the Board. Or am I the only clumsy one?


A sad day   May 26, 2003
 64 out of 77 found this review helpful

In the old days one could get a brilliant travel Scrabble set produced in the U.K. by J.W. Spear, which consisted of a light-weight but solid card with perforations for tiles with plastic prongs that fit comfortably and securely, even when one played on airplanes. It all came in a compact vinyl zipper case. We played our set so long for 15 years that the letters have been worn illegible.

The current replacement, produced by Mattel, is bigger, clumsier, less stable for traveling, and very likely to result in lost tiles. The hinged board is poorly constructed and breaks quite easily. The tiles and racks don't fit comfortably in the case when it closed, and unused racks, etc., need to be stashed elsewhere, which means they are also likely to get lost in transit. I'd love to find a replacement set for my Spear version.


The game you thought you knew   September 4, 2001
 13 out of 27 found this review helpful

Almost everyone knows scrabble but not everyone can afford to play it in the deluxe version. The beautiful solid wood pieces are a real sight for sore eyes and the soft felt goes nicely with the wood of the board. the idea of the game is that you play in turns and try to score as many points as possible (the letters are variously numbered according to their likelyhood of being used- E for example is the most often used letter in the english language so scores only 1 whereas Q and Z score a massive 10. There are also two blanks which do not score but you can use them to stand for any letter. The board has also got a number of squares which score double or triple word or letter. Play starts in the centre with a double word score (it being traditional in our family to let the youngest go first!) and then you swivel the board to the right you then build up a crossword where the the next word must always overlap with one that has gone before. I say always overlap but you may add to the beginning or end of words too. Reference to the dictionary is not allowed unless to check a word that has been queried. I gave the product 5 stars for educational value because I have found it most educational - particularly when it came to finding words with a Q but no U (and there are!) I have also found it disposes of a winter evening very well, so I gave it 5 stars for fun. I however have found that I did tend to lose the pieces and that and the fact that I did not want to look as though I was 'sucking up'made me give it 4 for duability!