Jugaccino

Electronic Arts has announced that they have decided to bring the loved board game, Scrabble, to the popular DS and PSP platforms, allowing the user to have a play on a handheld version of the board game.

But if you think that EA will just be placing a few letters on a 2 dimensional board then think again.  Electronic Arts are claiming that they will be bringing the gamer three different modes and lots of entertainingly different levels of difficulty to get the player thinking, as well as training exercises.  Alright, is does sound like EA have taken the board and stuck it into the DS platform, but EA are promising that it won’t be like that.

For example, the EA version of the game will have levels where the player will have to battle through the board with only the ability to use four letter words as a weapon.  The game also allows the use of wireless multiplayer connectivity which could prove quite useful when you’re in the mood to play someone in China.

Mark Blecher, Hasbro’s General Manager of digital media and gaming, claims that gamers have received the collaboration of the two gaming companies with loud cheer.  “The consumer response to Hasbro’s brands arriving on digital platforms in such fresh, inventive ways has been incredibly positive.”

“Scrabble has taken the US and Canadian markets by storm in a very short period of time and we expect the momentum to remain at full throttle through the Nintendo DS and PSP handheld releases and beyond.

“The level of creativity and meticulous execution that EA has poured into the re-imagination of the Scrabble and Hasbro Family Game Night experiences have set the bar very high for the many other games under development, but we’re confident that we’ve just scratched the surface of what digital fun feels, looks and plays like. It’s going to be a very exciting year for casual game fans.”

Electronic Arts are also planning on bringing the board game classics to Xbox Live, such as the likes of Scrabble, Boggle, Battleship, Yahtze, Connect Four, Sorry! and Sorry! Sliders.  The proposed games will be available from Spring 2009.

“We believe our Hasbro Family Game Night channel on Xbox LIVE Arcade will be one of the most dynamic and fun collections available on the platform.  We’ve been given the unique opportunity to create an exclusive EA Hasbro branded destination within the Xbox LIVE Arcade so players can easily find and play our line up of family-friendly digital board games,” announced the general manager of EA Hasbro, Chip Lange.

“Just as families have game closets in their home, they will also be able to stock a digital game closet serving up hours of interactive play for kids and adults alike,” Lange continued.

The original games were a clear success for years when they were released and even prove to be a success today so it will be interesting to see if the migration to the digital will work.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 7th, 2009 at 4:05 pm and is filed under Game Development, Gaming, Handheld Consoles, Nintendo DS, PSP. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.