denbeste@bbn.com (Steven Den Beste) (04/17/89)
My girlfriend is a Scrabble freak, so one time when she was accompanying me to "Memory Location", she picked up a copy of the Amiga version of the game from Electronic Arts. Comments follow: If they had chosen a smaller font, and had displayed the name, computer rating level and current score on one line, they could have made the small racks larger and could have included the point value on the letter pieces. We came up with other things we hated about it, too, but none of them is very important except one: We think there may be a bug in the score calculation code. She tacked the word "astir" onto the end of "yen" as followes: A y e n S T I R with the "R" landing on the triple word score on the bottom of the screen. By our calculation this should have been 26 points. The computer awarded us 74. My girlfriend was incensed at this. If the scoring is buggy, then she would have to keep score by hand, which is more than a little bit of a pain. We're not sure we believe all the words it has in its dictionary, either. It formed the word "WI", which we couldn't find either in my American Heritage dictionary, or in her 1978 edition Scrabble dictionary. If anyone out there has any relevant experience with this game, we'd appreciate it if you would EMAIL (not POST!) a reply. Steven C. Den Beste, BBN Communications Corp., Cambridge MA denbeste@bbn.com(ARPA/CSNET/UUCP) harvard!bbn.com!denbeste(UUCP)
ltf@killer.Dallas.TX.US (Lance Franklin) (04/19/89)
In article <38731@bbn.COM> denbeste@BBN.COM (Steven Den Beste) writes: >We're not sure we believe all the words it has in its dictionary, either. It >formed the word "WI", which we couldn't find either in my American Heritage >dictionary, or in her 1978 edition Scrabble dictionary. My paperback copy of the Webster's II New Riverside Dictionary lists WI as an abbreviation for Wisconsin. Sounds like they borrowed a spelling dictionary from some text editor (or perhaps the one I've seen advertised by the Austin Code Works ($60 for 234,932 words, from Webster's second dictionary). -- +-------------------------+ +-----------------------------------------------+ | Lance T Franklin | | I never said that! It must be some kind of a | | ltf@killer.DALLAS.TX.US | | forgery...I gotta change that password again. | +-------------------------+ +-----------------------------------------------+
disd@hubcap.clemson.edu (BJ Backitis) (04/20/89)
From article <761@cord.UUCP>, by nsw@cord.UUCP (Neil Weinstock): > In article <7883@killer.Dallas.TX.US> ltf@killer.Dallas.TX.US (Lance Franklin) writes: >>In article <38731@bbn.COM> denbeste@BBN.COM (Steven Den Beste) writes: >>an abbreviation for Wisconsin. Sounds like they borrowed a spelling dictionary >>from some text editor (or perhaps the one I've seen advertised by the Austin >>Code Works ($60 for 234,932 words, from Webster's second dictionary). > > If that's true, then it's really pathetic. I mean, what's the point of a > Scrabble game with an improper dictionary? Ideally, the full Scrabble > dictionary should be included, but at the very *least* the dictionary should > be a proper subset of the official Scrabble dictionary. Geez. That's what's > kept me from buying the program. Have people complained to the company about > the dictionary? If enough people bitch, maybe they'll fix it??? Yeah, but it's just not that bad. I've played dozens of games against it and I've seen few words that could not be found our dictionary. The thing that pisses me off is that the dictionary is so small. And that it doesn't "learn" words from its opponents. If you want a really good reason not to buy it, try the copy protection. Nasty nasty. But the game, and the dictionary by themselves are not enough to condemn the package. Throw in the CP, though, and you've got a bad deal. > > Looks like I'll have to find (gack!) human beings to play against. Finding an opponent is problem enough, but when your spouse is a Scrabble (tm) hater, it gets even tougher. :-) Gary -- Frank J. ("BJ") Backitis,Jr. | Lithuanian -- Information Systems Development | __|__ | and Damn Proud Clemson University, Clemson, SC |___|___|___| "Sveiks!" "Question authority... but make sure to raise your hand first."