Alfapet
Encyclopedia
Alfapet used to be the Swedish name for the well-known word game
Scrabble
. Most Swedes still think that Alfapet is the name of the original game, even if it is now a slightly different game.
The Swedish board game
company Alga introduced Alfapet in Sweden
in 1954 and sold the game under that name for almost four decades. However, in the early 1990s Alga lost its licence to sell Scrabble in Sweden to Mattel
, who started selling Scrabble with its original name. As it turned out, Alga had the right to the name Alfapet, and very soon constructed and marketed a different word game with the same name. Alfapet and other Alga products are now owned by the Swedish company BRIO
.
The new Alfapet word game differs in several ways from Swedish Scrabble:
Word game
Word games and puzzles are spoken or board games often designed to test ability with language or to explore its properties.Word games are generally engaged as a source of entertainment, but have been found to serve an educational purpose as well...
Scrabble
Scrabble
Scrabble is a word game in which two to four players score points by forming words from individual lettered tiles on a game board marked with a 15-by-15 grid. The words are formed across and down in crossword fashion and must appear in a standard dictionary. Official reference works provide a list...
. Most Swedes still think that Alfapet is the name of the original game, even if it is now a slightly different game.
The Swedish board game
Board game
A board game is a game which involves counters or pieces being moved on a pre-marked surface or "board", according to a set of rules. Games may be based on pure strategy, chance or a mixture of the two, and usually have a goal which a player aims to achieve...
company Alga introduced Alfapet in Sweden
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
in 1954 and sold the game under that name for almost four decades. However, in the early 1990s Alga lost its licence to sell Scrabble in Sweden to Mattel
Mattel
Mattel, Inc. is the world's largest toy company based on revenue. The products it produces include Fisher Price, Barbie dolls, Hot Wheels and Matchbox toys, Masters of the Universe, American Girl dolls, board games, and, in the early 1980s, video game consoles. The company's name is derived from...
, who started selling Scrabble with its original name. As it turned out, Alga had the right to the name Alfapet, and very soon constructed and marketed a different word game with the same name. Alfapet and other Alga products are now owned by the Swedish company BRIO
BRIO
BRIO is a wooden toy company founded in Sweden. The company was founded in the small town of Boalt, Scania in 1884 by basket maker Ivar Bengtsson For a long time the company was based in Osby, Scania, in southern Sweden. In 1908 Ivar's three sons took over and founded BRIO, which is an acronym for...
.
The new Alfapet word game differs in several ways from Swedish Scrabble:
- The board has 17 x 17 squares (instead of 15 x 15).
- There are more bonus squares (even quadruples) and also reduction squares.
- There are 120 tiles (instead of 100) and the values differ from the Swedish Scrabble set.
- The letters Q and W have separate tiles (but can only be played with blank tiles in Scrabble).
- There are several rule differences.