First Class Letters

First Class Letters is a word-making game where fast thinking can be more valuable than a huge vocabulary… although both doesn’t hurt.

Each player gets a sheet of paper and a pencil. Before the game begins in earnest, the three letter dice are rolled and players must fill in the boxes on their sheet with these letters (going alphabetically down the sheet). Then there are seven rounds: in each round the four dice are rolled, and players each think of a word related to them. The three standard dice show letters you ideally want to include, for points. The single red die shows a letter you CANNOT use.

You don’t have to work your way down the sheet – your word can go in any free space. It can include multiple other letters as long as it doesn’t use the red die. So for example if the letters are LGH and the red letter is E, then light would be a good option as it uses all three letters with no E. You’d score three points: one for each letter. Lamplight would be even better, as the L appears twice, so you’d get four points instead. Or haggling would get five points – there’s an H, an L and three Gs.

If you use all the letters at least once, you double your score for that round. And the first player to think of a word in each round also gets to flip a timer, increasing the pressure on the other players! After all seven rounds are complete, the player with the highest total score is the winner.

Sam says

Real-time play isn’t something I thrive on, especially when the ticking clock is against you and you’re trying to think of a word beginning with V that includes J, K and D. But First Class Letters only takes fifteen minutes to play and those breakthroughs where a word comes to mind feel extremely satisfying. I think the core audience for this title may be quite niche, but if you enjoy word games it’s certainly a fun undertaking, and strategically-speaking just going for easy options can put pressure on players who want to think longer… the game also has an optional ‘priority mail’ rule, where one of the letters must be included in the word no matter what. If you’re finding the basics to easy – well done – you can add this in too for an extra challenge.

Take That!

None, outside of the pressure of someone flipping the timer on you
Fidget Factor!

Almost absent, unless the 30 second timer feels too long
Brain Burn!

'Think of a word' is pretty easy. Factor in the starting letters, the letters to avoid, and the fact you really want duplicates if possible, and the light singe can get your sweating
Again Again!

It doesn't really change much from play to play, but if you like it the first time you'll probably like it the twentieth. The think-fast aspect keeps it tense as well.