Computer Based Scrabble Game

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1Background of the Project

Scrabble is an old classic board game, with game rules that are not very complicated. Compared to other classic board games, such as Chess, there are more factors to take into consideration when making a move in Scrabble. Apart from anagramming and generating words, there are other crucial decisions to make. A player would probably find several legal moves in one round, and then would have to decide which one to place. Choosing the move that generates the highest score is not always the ideal way to go. It could be that making such a move would create a situation in the next round where nothing could be done, or let the opponent score highly.

Making the choice of which move to use include many factors, and there are several different techniques and strategies one can follow to make the decision easier. Hitting the bonus squares can generate an extremely high score, hence one strategy is to try to always hit the bonus squares and prevent the opponent from doing the same. Another way of being successful is to prioritize using letters with high score, since they would not only generate a high total score to the player, but could also create difficult situations in the future if not used as soon as possible.

Scrabble game is a simple game played by four, three, two even one person. Scrabble game is also played with tiles and encountered on a special and well-designed board. The game can be played with a board disserted with a cross-like path. In between any of the two arms of the cross path is a center square calved out as a square box, which has a symbol of star.

At the down side of this board, there is a device called a Rack where the tiles are been placed before they are picked. This rack can be any colour depending on the developer or the user, titles and the rack can have the same colour. This rack is occupied by seven tiles at a starting and can be change or shuffle when the need arises. Each player has a starting point (middle) where he/she will place the tiles when picked. This spot is of different colour as the box (others) and is called the starting point. Other features of the board include smaller square boxes that make up the steps on the path which each tile steps on as it enters the path to produce a word. There are double and tripple word squares on the board. In the double word lines or square if two tiles that will generate a meaning are placed there, the player will score a high mark likewise the tripple word square. There are tiles, which are used to call for placement, which determine how the score is been ranked on the score device. Some makes use of the standard set number, while some make use of only seven (7) depending on the players.

When the game is being played, the objective of each player is to navigate his tile on the path to achieve a meaningful word. And any player whose tiles finished first wins the games or any player that scores the highest point wins the game i.e. top score or best player. But in other hand, the player whose tiles remain after number-of- players have finish, come last and become the worst looser. Each player must abide by the rules and regulation of the game that will be specified in subsequent chapters.