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Pictured: the board at the end of the latest game.
The Mother Thing and I have been playing Scrabble and Upwords fairly frequently during these past few weeks. It's been a close contest, although I have a 3:2 lead so far in Upwords. The Mother Thing disputes this record, and says one of her wins doesn't count because I suggested a better word location early on in a game she won. I say she had to build on that foundation for the rest of the game to stay ahead, so it still counts.
If you have not built up a good vocabulary, word games can be difficult. Upwords requires a completely different frame of mind to Scrabble, though, and simple words well placed can make a huge difference in the outcome of a game. Short, simple words have a much bigger impact on a small board without any word and letter score modifiers. Letter tiles also have no specific individual point value in Upwords. Score is determined by the total number of tiles in each word formed.
If a word is entirely composed of tiles on the first level, the word(s) created score two points per letter tile in the word. However, tiles can also be stacked to change existing words, and once this process begins, words with any stacked tiles are only worth one point per tile, but each tile in a stack also counts toward the point total.
The real score opportunities are where words interconnect, and where spelling changes thus affect both. A well-played new word may change one or more existing words, or a clever edit of existing words can create new ones. Either option can eventually result in high points for small changes. The cap is at five stacked letter tiles, though, so stacking is not an unlimited path to points.
The old family edition of the game is from 1997 according to the copyright notice, and features a 10x10 grid with 100 letter tiles. The original version had just an 8x8 grid and fewer letters. I haven't played that in, well, over 23 years now, I'd guess. We never owned it. I think we may have borrowed it from the library, though.
We played a lot of word games as part of our homeschooling lessons when I was a student. We also played Monopoly, Life, and Careers as a way to learn practical mathematics and money management. Apparently a lot of kids grow up never learning how to count change, much less plan ahead financially. Of course, those games are hardly good models of economics, and they also seemed to teach how little control we have over the outcomes of our best-laid plans, too. Curse you, spinners and dice! At least I learned the dangers of gambling, though.
In contrast to those games, the randomness of letter tiles in word games can be an opportunity. Yes, it can be difficult to use an X, Z, J, or Q, but the reward for using them well is worth it. Instead of teaching rudimentary planning and investment, these word games reward creative responses to difficult circumstances. Both are necessary skills in an uncertain world. Whether I learned them well enough is still open to debate.
