EITM: Scrabble Together 4/10/24

Or not.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Scrabble announced yesterday that they were makingsome big I didn't even know it was
scrabble at first. I just sawsomething that said like like like vintage or
heritage game makes first change in likegenerations. So I was like, oh,
okay, well I'll see what thisis. And then it's Scrabble is
changing it scrabbles fun. That's athat's a fun game. I do well

(00:23):
with that. The you usually talkabout how you're very very good at it,
the yeah I mean, but Iyeah, I mean the short answer
is yes, I know a lotof words and good point words, but
I don't understand. I read thearticle twice. I don't understand what they're
changing. Oh the board certainly looksdifferent, don't you flip it over?

(00:47):
What's that? It's like a twosided board and there's cards now that come
with it. Wait, so whatis the Okay, so I was confused
from the beginning. So regular scrabbleboard, right, I flip that over,
and then that's where scrabble together iswhat does what does that board look
like? The flipped overboard? It'spretty similar. It's just aren't their rule

(01:08):
to you. I've never played aproper game of scrabble. So I'm maybe
not the best person that you neverscrabbled. I've sat down and played,
but I've certainly never seen it throughto a winner. How do you win
points? Well, you get ridof all your tiles. Oh I thought
you kept having to get new tilesuntil don't work your way through all of

(01:29):
them, right, I mean atsome point the bag is empo. So
I've definitely never played to the endof the game. Yeah, exactly exactly.
And you you want as you go, you you want to Diane's right,
you want to collect points. Solike you, let's say you have
a really good word xenophobia, that'salways a no, that's always a good
one. That's always a good one. He's he's never put that down on
the board. Okay, uh,xenophobia, triple word, triple letter,

(01:55):
Like you those really start adding up, right? Yeah, just as you
are. Doesn't mean you did.And then Diane takes the A off of
my xenophobia and she puts a Tnext to it and she gets at Well,
they kept saying that this is supposedto be a less intimidating version of
scrabble. I used Diian, it'sjust the opponent I used Diane's tea in

(02:20):
at right, and I lay downTarannosaurus so you could see already I'm collected
points like crazy, and then offof my s in Tarannosaurus, Diane puts
an o down and she's got SoMattel said, it conducted research and it
showed that competitiveness is declining among youngergenerations. Oh in general, yes,

(02:49):
really, no way, meaning orpeople aren't buying scrabble. So we're trying
something new. Why would you?Why would you play if you're not trying
to win? Collaborative games that featurea lot of teamwork are selling better out
than solo competition games. Okay,I shouldn't say solo. It's not solitaire,
but where it's one person, onev everybody out Yeah, okay on

(03:14):
their own. And by the way, there may be some truth to that,
because if you think of like onlinegaming and stuff, you may be
playing with a group, but you'restill trying to win. So is is
the new scrabble like it would belike Tyler and I against Kristen and Diane.
Instead of competing, players work togetherto complete goals and use helper cards

(03:35):
for assistance. Oh dear god,so everybody wins oh, hopefully, and
everybody no, not hopefully, nothopefully. This is stupid. It's also
faster paced. Did they faster paced? How long does it take to spell
a word? Oh, that's whatI said, like about finishing one.
I just don't have the patience tosit down and play what I assume rivals

(03:59):
Monopoly and oh no, no,no, it's nowhere close to the length
of another. There's only a setnumber of tiles, and word games can
be intimidating to certain people. Areyou looking at me for You're you're saying
that you're spelling out words that youdon't have half the tiles for? No,
I do, Oh you got enoughon that little debt for Tarannosaurus if

(04:21):
I if I have them. Yes, I'm not just lay I'm not just
saying, well, I've got thet and yeah, so this is Tarannosaurus.
I'm putting my tiles down, okay, and I'm playing and I'm picking
up tiles. So my next word, my next word may be off of
the r may be like rigamarole,okay, but that doesn't mean I have

(04:42):
all of the tiles. Okay.Yeah, so instead of calling the scrabble
like did Mattel say we're also changingthe name to like just pussy scrabble together.
That's dumb. I'm looking at someof the cards. Well, that's
the other game card. I don'twhat are what are the card? There's
like there are some people that willplay with a scrabbled dictionary. Was that

(05:04):
just to keep everyone honest? Yeah, because sometimes people will make a word
up, like for no, no, I'll give you an example. Uh
huh. I'll give you an example. Is like sometimes and I'm just using
a word that Jackie has used before, like she'll go smegma, and I'll
go, jack I don't know ifslang counts, and so you have to

(05:25):
check is that slang or is thatI would imagine that's probably in a dictionary.
You think smegma is in the dictionary? The name of that toaster,
isn't it okay? First of all, if it's the name of a toaster,
that's a pronoun, which is notacceptable. Number two, I don't
think smegma noun is that. Thisis Miriam Webster, y'all, the secretion

(05:50):
of a sebaceous gland. Start itlike you're writing an essay. Miriam Webster
says, findgma as that crust.Oh so smegma is in the the dictionary.
Oh, I take that back,yep, but that clearly leads to

(06:14):
questions point of origin, your wienerand controversy for our team versions. I'm
not playing the team. Uh whoam I? Am? I with Kristen
first? Your goal card says playa two letter word? Oh? Why
would you play a two letter word? There's no points in that. See,
I thought Kristin would have found withit. She just gave me a

(06:35):
look like I am playing thats whywould you? Why would you play it?
Too? Like? Here, takethis gun by the way, and
name a two letter s word.So, yeah, see, but you
can't use that. That's Mexican,right, Spanish? Those two letter words
are the shortest playable words allowed.Yeah, like Diane did so and act

(06:57):
I did Tarannosaurus xenophobia. And theygive you a little tip to the oh
tip two letter word with an s. It has to be a vowel.
This is the dumbest thing ever.The tip says, pay attention to the
letters on the board to unlock thepotential of your tile. No does stupid?

(07:17):
You need a card to know thatthe the letters on the board.
Well, no, dues well no, because you can also no, it's
not upsetting, it's stupid. Youcan also though, no, no,
no, no. But you canalso free space a word. Now what
does that mean? Just start inthe middle, like meaning you're not talking

(07:40):
about connecting a word. Yeah,you could free space a word, but
then that also starts a change.I didn't know that. Yeah, yeah
you can free space. Is therea penalty? Is it like buying a
vowed to pay to do that?No? Pay with what? There's no
money? I mean, I'm happyto play for money. This is the
dumbest thing. Seriously, this isdumb. Our next goal play a word

(08:01):
containing two of the same consonant.Consonants are letters that aren't vowels, Diane,
So your vowels are ae io yousometimes sometimes why thank you? Great
song. So let's say Apple.Well, I was gonna say Tennessee because

(08:22):
I was thinking of no, no, because that's multiple, that's multiple two
nds, two s's. Yeah,you see, and that's the problem.
You went with Apple, where youonly get double ps. I'm doing Tennessee
where I'm getting multiple multiples. Itsays, well, we're all playing together.
Why do I feel like we're allplaying together? It's like we're playing
tugle war, but I'm the onlyone pulling. No, people don't want

(08:45):
to play with you because we seehow you are. But even you said
you don't want to play this version, Diane, Oh, because it's I
don't know. Oh there's also nomore scoring. What do you mean you
don't want to hurt feelings? Ohmy god? Say is the right here
in the the box? Did theyje pussy woke? Is that hyphenated?
Can you do that? How manypoints is that? I don't know,

(09:09):
But that's where this comes from.So how do you figure out who wins?
Why would you play if you're nottrying to win? It says when
you finish goals, you just takethe cards. Oh my god, does
it come with a participation trophy?Don't you agree? Why are we playing
it if we're not trying to win? My card says right here. To

(09:33):
accomplish this goal, just free upyour rack. That's it. That's why
I'm playing free enough the rack andI'm laying down free space brazier. This
is the dumbest thing ever, youknow what. I hope scrabble goes out
of business. Yeah, no,this is dumb. New goal card just

(09:56):
drawn from the pile. Play avertical word? What does it matter?
What does it matter? I gotan idea. Play the word on the
spaces. That's gonna get you themost points. We don't keep score?
Yeah we do. Is this becauseMatella's making so much money off of Barbie?

(10:18):
They're just like, man, let'sjust punt this one and see what
happens. No, they are inthe money making business. I told you
that they are in the money makingbusiness. What company is like, you
know what we should do other thaniHeart? What company it? Maybe Odyssey
being in Cumulus is in the businessof not making money. Yeah, they
didn't put out Barbie and go,Well, you know what, let's just

(10:41):
float it. Who cares? It? Does? Say? You can put
a number on the goal. Cardsneeded to be completed to determine a winner.
Well, there is no winner fasterthan keeping traditional score. Oh,
this is like the people who wantto play monopoly. Also just a stick

(11:01):
in my ass. No, No, these are the people that want to
play Monopoly and go instead of goingaround the board to collect property, let's
deal the cards out before we start. Oh God, let's fast track it.
I have an idea. Let's notplay. Yes, when is the

(11:22):
last time, When is the lasttime I don't want to keep it casual?
When is the you can still haveyou can have fun and compete.
Competing is fun. When is thelast time you went to trivia night and
they were like nobody? It doesn'tmatter if you get the words right or
not, doesn't matter. Just giveus a fun team name. But it
can't hurt anybody's feelings. So youcan be branded, and you can bring

(11:46):
Karen and you can be woke.Meanwhile, Elliott's crumbling up his ideas for
team names. The I'm not yeah, no, I'm not even I'm not
even playing these It would be deemedof No feelings are allowed to be hurt.
This is dumb. Is this forsale it? Or is it a
coming soon? How about coming never? They if you would have told me,

(12:09):
they should have released this info onApril first, so that on the
backlash they could have been They couldhave like posted on X they could have
posted j U S T, spaceK I D D I N G,
which, by the way, kiddingyou get you a double consonant. Melania
agrees with you, Dian, thissounds awful. Participation trophies strike again.

(12:31):
You know what this reminds me of. This reminds me almost sped the coffee.
When it's like, un, letsyou deal the cards out? I
have an idea, let's deal youout. No, like eight you hockey,
we don't. We don't keep score. We just want the kids to
go and play. Yeah we do, Yeah we do. Why do we
get into travel hockey if we're notkeeping score? You want you you don't

(12:52):
want to keep score? Go togo to Saturday afternoon pick up, so
you're there with your big whiteboard andyour sharpie. Don't have to score.
No. Not only that, whenit was eight U, I always knew.
I always made sure that that thatthe kids that my kids team,
they knew the score, and Iwould make sure that they knew it loud
enough that the other kids on theother team, whose coaches were like,

(13:13):
we don't keep scoring, I waslike, well they're going to know they're
losing. The hell where am Igoing, Kristen, I'm sorry, Going
back to that pile and drawing anothergoal card. This one says play a
word containing at least two different vowels. Oh, I got it, two
vowels. I'm gonna use au anda y I'm going to use the name
of the game pussy hi Yalliah themorning, get out the dictionary. Hello

(13:41):
you, hey, good morning.How are you? I am great?
Thank you? How are you good? Here's two situations I think this game
would be like relevant. One like, if you're teaching your kid how to
play grabble is like a great likeintroduction to the game if your kids are
a little or like it's for ateacher using it as like a sonics type

(14:03):
game to help reinforce them skills thatlike a student doesn't know. Okay,
first of all, I'm not playing. If I'm playing scrabble in school,
we're playing for something. I'm gettingsomebody's lunch, right, I'm getting somebody.
Your competitive, but it has nothingto do with that. It has
nothing to do with my being competitive. But why are we sitting down to

(14:24):
play a game if nobody wins?Well, I also agree with your other
point that was talking about how kidsare not competitive anymore or the generation.
I see that all the time.I see it in school. I'm a
teacher. I see it all thetime. And then my own kids are
in sports and kids are just notcompetitive, like they don't care, they

(14:45):
don't have that killer instinct that drivesto want to in anymore. Good.
Keep your kids fired up, tellthem to go got to win. You
know who? Yes, for example, do you think last night, thank
you, ma'am, thank you.Do you think Spencer Carberry walked into the
CAP's locker room before the game lastnight, was like, hey, you
know what, it doesn't matter.I talked to Lalan, Detroit's coach.
We just want to go out andjust pass the puck around. We're gonna

(15:07):
treat it like EIGHTU hockey where nobody'skeeping score and then at the end we'll
all make the playoffs. No,kiss my ass, We're going to play.
You've made this very personal. Butthis is not scrabble. This is
scrabble together. This is dumb twogames in one. It's on the other
side of the board. You stillcan play. I should get points,

(15:30):
I should get money off on buyingreal scrabble. Then you know, you
know what this is. Let megive you another one, you know,
let me give you another one.Yeah, we're gonna play. We're gonna
play yatzi. But instead of gettingall fives, just whatever numbers are there,
just fill in the fives, doesn'tmatter and we'll give you a card
collect dice. I used to havelike the kids version of Mickey Mouse Yazzi

(15:52):
growing up. Yeah, but youstill played the same way. They was
a little easier. I feel likeit was like faces of characters instead of
right, okay, but it wasstill you'd get three for a full house.
You would get three goofies and twominis or whatever it was. So
you have no problem with that whenit's maybe, are you still competing adapted

(16:14):
to an audience? Are we stillcompeting? Because I'm thinking of adapting scrabble
to a less competitive generation.