Customer Reviews

HANDMARK Scrabble for Windows & Palm

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

The following refers to version 1.1, which has hi-res support and looks great. The interface is easy to use and there are helpful features like word lookup, score history, and hints. The hints, though, are often not very good, because the AI even at expert level is simply not a sound player. It seems to rely on its vast knowledge of the official Scrabble dictionary (which is a maddeningly inconsistent book, but at least it's a standard) without paying much attention to strategy. For example, it will routinely play an "s" for 5 or 6 points rather than keeping it in hand for a killer move; and when it discards letters, it always seems to discard all 7. It also frequently overlooks obvious better plays.

If you routinely score 300 points or better, you won't have much trouble beating this game. But it does give good practice, and it's a great way to learn obscure but handy words for your next game against a human opponent.

I strongly recommend this game to play during subway rides and to develop your Scrabble skills. I used to struggle to get 200 points in a 2-player game, but I can now routinely score 300-400 points after learning several tips and tricks. If you allow the program to help you by suggesting words, you can learn lots of convenient 2-letter words and good ways to use Q, J, and Z to take advantage of bonus squares. It's a great game to play while you're waiting in line or traveling. The only problem I've had is that if you save and restart a game later, the computer word suggestions are sometimes invalid. Otherwise, it's great!

I just got this game a few days ago and already love the way it looks on my new visor prisim. The ability to beam each turn is espically nice when we are waiting for the movies or anytime we are stuck in traffic. The board is easy to see (in color) and can switch between IR and single player mode. I highly recommend for people who like scrabble to get this game if they have color- I did not like the trial version on my grayscale PDA.

I was very happy with the Palm OS Scrabble game until I discovered that MANY words were not included in the game's dictionary.
Often, words were not cross-checked, so that a word, acceptable for the palm, when made plural, would be counted as wrong for the non-Palm player, even though it was correct in a regular dictionary (e.g. daydream/daydreams.) I also found that a word would be considered right for the Palm, but wrong for the player. This was frustrating and discouraged further play.
I would love to see an expanded and accurate dictionary created soon.

I think this game is great and the implementation on PalmOS PDA is fantastic. Not only is the color usage great, but fitting everything onto a small pixel screen is amazing. I never feel that it is too small, though.

My only complaint is the dictionary. It does not use OWL (Official Tournament and Club Word List) but some version of OSW (Official Scrabble Words) or OSPD (Official Scrabble Players Dictionary), the combination of which is usually called SOWPODS. Grrrr. So, on some words that I know are words accepted in professional play, I end up hitting "accept word" after I get the popup saying it is not a word. [edit: Turns out to be OSPD, which is still quite limiting]

The latest version has the definitions, but I don't care for that. Many people will, though, and it is a great feature. I either know the definition or don't care, but I do not have the memory space in my PDA with all my other applications. Perhaps when I upgrade my PDA I will add in the defintions.

Complaints aside, this is a great implementation of a great game and have it on my PDA. You should, too. Definitely a five-star game.

I recently got a Palm m125 for Christmas, and a couple of expansion cards for it. I got a Dictionary/Thesarus for it, which comes in handy for this student, and language translator, since I just can't seem to get the A in French, and Scrabble.

Normally, I would be forced to play this game with my family, and on occasion I would loose. I couldn't even score a good 150, while my parents, and even my younger brother were scoring in the 200's.

Well, after sitting through study halls with nothing to do, i decided to give this game a try. Suddenly, I was addicted. There are lots of levels of difficulty, and the game looks and plays great on the m125(even it is grayscale, but it acttually looks nice). The computer will even give you suggestions if you can't think up of a word on your own. I don't know if anyone else has recognized this, but if you save your current game and bring it up again later to play, sometimes(keyword is sometimes)the computer suggestions for words may not work, but this is definately not a major problem, and the mild player may never even notice this.

Now, when I go to play Saturday nights with my family, I can easily come in second place, if not first. I'll score up 100 to maybe even 200 points routinely now. This game works with the Palm m125, m500, and m505. I would geuss it works with Visors, but you'd have to doub;e check to make sure. In all, this game can really increase your vocabulary, and most of all though, its fun.

It is definitely not challenging. It might exercise the abilities of a complete beginer but I can't see this version of this game providing stimulation for anyone who regularly scores even 250's in the regular game.
I found the tiles hard to read (and I use an M505).
It's levels are not configurable (you can't tune the computer to play "smarter" or "dumber" to match your abilities). The developers need to work harder on this one. Until then, I will be returning it to the store.

I downloaded the software, but it would install on my system. Even though I had the correct version it wouldn't install on my system. I'm running Win98. First thing the install wizard looked for was Palm OS drivers. Since they weren't on my system, no installation....

Very enjoyable, so long as you understand that the computer opponent plays differently than a typical human opponent. Even when you set the opponent's level to "Novice", it will frequently come up with obscure words like "xu", "jiao", "tyee" or "aioli". It's also better that most casual players at finding places to create multi-word combinations. It knows that a well-placed 2- or 3-letter word will often score higher than a larger word somewhere else. But it's still beatable and fun, and it will probably help make you a better player.

Handmark has not updated this to the new dictionary and when asked said it has no plans to do so. Serious club and tournament players will also be annoyed that it uses the official dictionary and not the club/tournament word list. On the other hand, with top-level play chosen, using a Windows PDA, it plays low expert-level Scrabble at good speed, it gives hints, and it includes the definitions: if you're carrying a PDA anyway, there's no need to carry the official dictionary (except of course for new and "dirty" words). I do wish there were a new version.