I am comparing the Scrabble game by Hasbro Gaming in a bright red box with white "SCRABBLE" on front and pictures of lots of letter tiles that I purchased on July 13, 2019 ..... AND
a Scrabble game I purchased over 40 years ago that came in what I consider a purple box, some may call it dark burgundy or dark wine. My old game has gold lettering on the box, no pictures, and the box is kind of a textured cardboard, not smooth and glossy.
COMPARISON:
For anyone who just wants the main two differences without reading everything:
1. The new game has a larger board, but the actual playing area of the board is almost the same.
The new board has a wider strip down one side to say "SCRABBLE" and to tell you how many of each letter there are. It tells you this on both sides of the border, facing the player who sits on either side.
2. The new game has lightweight red plastic racks to hold your letters. My old game has heavy duty wooden racks. Both WORK fine, but I prefer wood personally.
If you want more exact specs and differences, as well as what HASN'T changed, read on:
Old Board measures a tad over 14 1/4 x 14. The actual playing area is 12 1/4 x 11.
New Board measures just shy of 15 1/2 x 14. The actual playing area is 12 1/2 x 11 1/4.
Both boards fold in half. Mine is still in great condition. Hopefully new board will hold up as well.
The backside of the old board is purple (or wine?). The back side of the new board is black.
The instructions are printed inside the lid on the old game; on a nice brochure in the new game.
The box for the old game measures 14 1/2 x 7 1/2 and is kind of textured heavy duty cardboard.
The new game box measures 15 3/4 x 7 1/2 and is a lighter weight standard cardboard game box.
The old game tells you only on one end of the board how many of each letter, so it is upside down
and hard to see for the person sitting on the opposite side. The new board has it printed on both ends of the wide border, facing in the direction of the person sitting on either side, so it's easy to read for both.
The Double Letter, Double Word, Triple Word colored squares on the board are the same on both.
The letter tiles are the same size in both and definitely look and feel like wood to me, in both. There are 98 letters and 2 blanks in both games, and the same number of each letter in both games. (There are more of commonly used letters such as vowels, especially E and A, and N's and R's. And only one of letters like J, Q, X and Z, but the same number of each letter in both games.)
The really big difference: the nice wooden racks in the old game vs. the cheap red plastic racks in the new game. Although I greatly prefer the wooden ones, I did not deduct a star for three reasons: 1, people who have never used the old game with wooden racks would probably think nothing of the plastic ones since most games these days have everything plastic everything. (Had the letter tiles been plastic, I WOULD have deducted a star!) 2, the plastic racks get the job done, no problem. 3, the price of this game, $11.99 when I bought it, is very reasonable for what you get, so it wouldn't be fair to expect the same quality of a game you pay considerably more for.
The letters look to me like they are printed in slightly larger, thicker type on the new tiles, which is a GOOD thing. Still black letters, against very light wood tiles, which is best.
The new game came with a black drawstring back, plenty large enough to hold all the letters with ease. My old game did not come with a bag, but I am fine with keeping them on the bottom of the box under the board.
I consider this game a good value for the money and I would definitely recommend it, although I would point out to anyone I recommended it to that it has plastic racks, so they aren't disappointed.
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