 A grid ofBoggle cubes and asand timer | |
| Manufacturers | Parker Brothers (nowHasbro) Winning Moves Games USA |
|---|---|
| Designers | Allan D. Turoff (Inventor) |
| Publication | 1972; 53 years ago (1972) |
| Genres | Word game Dice game |
| Players | 2+ |
| Setup time | 1 minute |
| Skills | Language |
| Materials required | Paper and writing utensil |
Boggle is aword game introduced in 1972 and in which players try to find as many words as they can from a grid of lettereddice, within a set time limit. It was invented by Allan Turoff[1] and originally distributed byParker Brothers.[2]
One player begins the game by shaking a covered tray of 16 cubic dice, each with a different letter printed on each of its sides. The dice settle into a 4×4 tray so that only the top letter of each cube is visible. After they have settled into the tray, a three-minutesand timer is started and all players simultaneously begin the main phase of play.[3]
Each player searches for words that fit the following criteria:
Multiple forms of the same word are allowed, such as singular and plural forms and other derivations. Each player records all the words they find by writing on a private sheet of paper. After three minutes have elapsed, all players must immediately stop writing and the game enters the scoring phase.
In this, each player reads off their list of discovered words. If two or more players wrote the same word, it is removed from all players' lists. Any player may challenge the validity of a word, in which case a previously nominateddictionary is used to verify or refute it. Once all duplicates and invalid words have been eliminated, points are awarded based on the length of each remaining word in a player's list. The winner is the player whose point total is highest, with any ties typically broken by a count of long words.
One cube is printed with "Qu". This is becauseQ is nearly always followed byU in English words (seeexceptions), and if there were aQ inBoggle, it would be challenging to use if aU did not, by chance, appear next to it. For the purposes of scoring,Qu counts as two letters; for example,squid would score two points (for a five-letter word) despite being formed from a chain of only four cubes. Early versions of the game had a "Q" without the accompanying "u".
Merriam-Webster publishes theOfficial Scrabble Players Dictionary, which is also suitable forBoggle.[4] This dictionary includes all variant forms of words up to eight letters in length. A puzzle book entitled100 Boggle Puzzles (Improve Your Game) offering 100 game positions was published in theUK in 2003 but is no longer in print.
| Word length | Points |
|---|---|
| 3, 4 | 1 |
| 5 | 2 |
| 6 | 3 |
| 7 | 5 |
| 8+ | 11 |
Different versions ofBoggle have varying distributions of letters. For example, a more modern version in the UK has easier letters, such as only oneK, but an older version (with a yellow box, from 1986) has two Ks and a generally more awkward letter distribution.
Using the sixteen cubes in a standardBoggle set, the list oflongest words that can be formed includesinconsequentially,quadricentennials, andsesquicentennials, all seventeen-letter words made possible byq andu appearing on the same face of one cube.[2]
Words within words are allowed, such as "mast" and "aster" within "master". Neither the cubes nor the board may be touched while the timer is running.
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Parker Brothers has introduced several licensed variations on the game.
Boggle Jr. is a much-simplified version intended for young children introduced in 1988.Boggle Travel is a version of the standard 4×4 set designed to be traveled. The compact, zippered case includes pencils and small pads of paper, as well as an electronic timer, and notably, a cover made from a soft plastic that produces much less noise when the board is shaken.
Big Boggle, later marketed asBoggle Master andBoggle Deluxe, featured a 5×5 tray, and disallowed three-letter words. Some editions of theBig Boggle set included an adapter that could convert the larger grid into a standard 4×4 Boggle grid. In theUnited Kingdom, Hasbro UK releasedSuper Boggle in 2004 (now discontinued), which features both the 4×4 and 5×5 grid and an electronic timer that flashes to indicate the start and finish.[5] Despite the game's popularity in North America, no version ofBoggle offering a 5×5 grid was marketed outside Europe for an extended period until 2011, when Winning Moves Games USA revived theBig Boggle name for a new version. Their variant features a two-letter die with popular letter combinations such as Qu, Th and In.[6]
In 2008, Parker Brothers released a self-contained version of the game with the dice sealed inside a plastic unit and featuring an integrated timer. Although the older version has been discontinued, some retailers refer to the newer one as "Boggle Reinvention" to avoid confusion.
In 2012, Winning Moves Games USA released a 6×6 version of the game calledSuper Big Boggle. In addition to the two-letter dice with popular letter combinations, there is also a die containing three faces which are solid squares. These solid squares represent a word stop, which is simply a space that may not be used in any word. The other changes are that the time limit was increased from three minutes to four minutes, three-letter words are no longer allowed, and there is a modified scoring scheme, outlined below.
| Scoring for the 6×6 version | |
|---|---|
| Word length | Points |
| 4 | 1 |
| 5 | 2 |
| 6 | 3 |
| 7 | 5 |
| 8 | 11 |
| 9+ | 2 points per letter |
OtherBoggle variants have included:
Numerous unofficial computer versions and variants of the game are available. By 1989, users ofMIT'sProject Athena competed in theonline gamemboggle.[7] In 2013,Ruzzle, a mobile phone game based onBoggle, topped the most-downloaded iPhone apps chart.[8] Other games similar to or influenced byBoggle includeBananagrams,Bookworm,Dropwords,Letterpress,Puzzlage,SpellTower,Word Factory,Wordquest,Word Racer,WordSpot,Word Streak with Friends,WordTwist, andZip-It.
Hub Network game showFamily Game Night featured a game titledBounce and Boogie Boggle, which used an electronic 5x5 game. Based on Boggle Reinvention, the main difference is that the letters would be displayed on the stage screen, and the players would have to jump on the letters in order to display their choice. Despite being part of the TV series, this game did not feature on its video game counterpartHasbro Family Game Night 4: The Game Show.
While not as widely institutionally established asScrabble, several clubs have been established for the purpose of organizingBoggle play. OfficialBoggle clubs exist at a number of educational institutions, including theDartmouth Union of Bogglers atDartmouth College,[9] theWestern Oregon University Boggle Club,[10] theUniversity of Michigan Boggle Club,[11] Berkeley Boggle Club at the University of California, Berkeley,[12] CCA Boggle Club at Canyon Crest Academy, andGrinnell College Boggle Club.[13]
UnlikeScrabble, there is no national or international governing or rule-making body forBoggle competition and no official tournament regulations exist.[14] When it comes to creatingBoggle games for tournament play, most of the time it is done by special software designed to generate completely random and probably fair boards, using words oftentimes pre-selected by the officiating committee.[15]
Games magazine includedBoggle in their "Top 100 Games of 1980", praising it as a "fast-moving word game".[16]
