Dictionary for word game

Word Game Dictionary

The aim of the project is to provide a simple way for game developers to check a standard or custom dictionary for word matches.

I have included the OSPD English scrabble dictionary, but realistically any dictionary (or even multiple) could be used.

Why create this project?

There are a few reasons to have a game development specific set of dictionaries

• Using device dictionaries may yield undesired results. Many device dictionaries contain proper nouns, user saved words, or slang.
• Device dictionaries are typically designed for spellchecking. This means developers have to implement or subvert complex methods to yield the desired result.
• A custom library can help localization without requiring a user’s device is in a specific language to access other dictionaries.
• I couldn’t already find one on the internet.

Usage

iOS & OSX

Default usage of the OSPD Dictionary

Objective-C

WordGameDictionary* wgd = [[WordGameDictionary alloc] init];
[wgd checkWord:wordToCheck minimumLength:3]

Swift

var wgd = WordGameDictionary();
wgd.checkWord(wordToCheck, minimumLength: 3);

Using a custom dictionary

Objective-C

WordGameDictionary* wgd = [[WordGameDictionary alloc] initWithDictionaryFile:@"SPDR"];
[wgd checkWord:wordToCheck minimumLength:3]

Swift

var wgd = WordGameDictionary("SPDR");
wgd.checkWord(wordToCheck, minimumLength: 3);

Unity

Default usage of the OSPD Dictionary

C#

WordGameDict wgd = new WordGameDict();
wgd.CheckWord(wordToCheck, 3);

UnityScript

var wgd:WordGameDict = WordGameDict();
wgd.checkWord(wordToCheck, 3);

Using a custom dictionary

C#

WordGameDict wgd = new WordGameDict("SPDR.txt");
wgd.CheckWord(wordToCheck, 3);

UnityScript

var wgd:WordGameDict = WordGameDict("SPDR.txt");
wgd.checkWord(wordToCheck, 3);

Java

Coming Soon

C++

Coming Soon

Closing thoughts

Hopefully this library helps simplify your word game development. Let me know if you use it in your game!

Some Of The Cool Dictionaries
You’ll Find On MY Little Bookshelf

There are plenty of dictionaries out there in wherever-they-make-dictionaries-land, but not many of them are particularly useful to the dedicated word gamer and puzzle solver. Over the years I’ve fine-tuned my collection so that whenever I need to find a word or create a word list for a game or puzzle, I don’t have to go too far.

Here are the dictionaries I’m talking about, along with the reason they made it onto my ‘elite’ little bookshelf…

21st Century Crossword Puzzle Dictionary

I’ve got a pretty decent collection of crossword dictionaries on my bookshelf, but I’ve only listed one of them on this page. Why? Because, oddly, it’s the only one I’ve found that does what I think a crossword puzzle dictionary should do.

Kevin McCann’s 21st Century Crossword Puzzle Dictionary focuses exclusively on the sorts of crossword answers that actually turn up frequently in published puzzles.

Years ago Kevin created a crossword database using thousands of clues and answers from major American newspapers — it’s been quietly chugging away ever since. He used this database to put together a dictionary with entries that look exactly like the ones in your morning paper. Which they should, of course, because that’s exactly where he got them

If you want to know all possible synonyms of a word, you should consult a reputable thesaurus. But if you’re interested primarily in words and clues that actually tend to appear in crosswords, this tome is a little-known gem. Read more…

Chambers Dictionary

For years, Chambers has had a stronghold on the word game market.

One of the reasons for this is that Chambers Dictionary is jam-packed with all those crazy words you find in crossword puzzles and on Scrabble boards, but never in the real world.

I mean, where else will you find delicious entries like EUOI, a cry of Bacchic frenzy, and YRIVD, an obsolete past participle of rive? Yet, despite its indulgence in such lexical obscurities, the dictionary remains a perfect size for browsing in bed. Read more…

Collins Official Scrabble Dictionary

If you are at all serious about your Scrabble — even if you are a lounge room player — I highly recommend you have an ‘official’ dictionary on your shelf that unambiguously tells you whether any given word is in or out. But be careful with the word ‘Official’!

This bulky tome is the official Scrabble dictionary endorsed by the World English Scrabble Players Association (WESPA). You can get a copy of Collins Official Scrabble Words here.

Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary

Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary has long played an important role in word games and competitions throughout America. As a collegiate dictionary, it is not as comprehensive (or obscure!) as Webster’s Unabridged, of course. But it is more than rich enough to challenge virtually every English-speaker’s vocabulary in the country. For that reason, it is used as the primary word reference in most spelling bees (e.g. the AARP Senior National Spelling Bee) and is the main word source used for compiling the Official Scrabble Players Dictionary.

Official Scrabble Players Dictionary

Whenever I meet someone who finds out how serious I am about Scrabble, the first question I get asked is ‘What is the official dictionary for Scrabble?’ The answer depends on where you live…

It turns out that there are two official Scrabble dictionaries. This one, The Official Scrabble Players Dictionary, is the official word authority in North America. In all other parts of the world, the authority is Collins Official Scrabble Dictionary.

Actually, the story does get a tad more complicated than this. You see, the OSPD, as this dictionary is usually called, is only ‘officially’ endorsed for Scrabble games played in the School & Family setting. Why?

Because several years ago the OSPD was, somewhat controversially at the time, cleansed of all terms deemed to be ‘offensive’. Since offensive terms do not violate the original rules of Scrabble, official tournament and club organizers put all the offensive words back in again! Needless to say, that list is not sold to the general public (but see the tip below).

TIP! If you have the Electronic Version
of the Official Scrabble Players Dictionary, you can get access to all the removed words by doing this: at the Ready prompt, type in **otcwl and press Enter. The Ready prompt will be replaced with the Search OTCW List prompt, which stands for Official Tournament & Club Word List. Hey Presto! You’re ready to start checking naughty words

Webster’s 3rd New International Dictionary

Webster’s Unabridged, as it is usually abbreviated, is the official word reference used by Scripps National Spelling Bee, and a perfect place to hunt for unusual and impossible-to-spell words.

This is also one of very few reference works that still gets printed in a beautiful binding on fine, high-quality paper, making it a pleasure to leaf through. Sexy even…

Return to Word Games Home from Dictionaries for Word Buffs

Word Game Dictionary

The aim of the project is to provide a simple way for game developers to check a standard or custom dictionary for word matches.

I have included the OSPD English scrabble dictionary, but realistically any dictionary (or even multiple) could be used.

Why create this project?

There are a few reasons to have a game development specific set of dictionaries

• Using device dictionaries may yield undesired results. Many device dictionaries contain proper nouns, user saved words, or slang.
• Device dictionaries are typically designed for spellchecking. This means developers have to implement or subvert complex methods to yield the desired result.
• A custom library can help localization without requiring a user’s device is in a specific language to access other dictionaries.
• I couldn’t already find one on the internet.

Usage

iOS & OSX

Default usage of the OSPD Dictionary

Objective-C

WordGameDictionary* wgd = [[WordGameDictionary alloc] init];
[wgd checkWord:wordToCheck minimumLength:3]

Swift

var wgd = WordGameDictionary();
wgd.checkWord(wordToCheck, minimumLength: 3);

Using a custom dictionary

Objective-C

WordGameDictionary* wgd = [[WordGameDictionary alloc] initWithDictionaryFile:@"SPDR"];
[wgd checkWord:wordToCheck minimumLength:3]

Swift

var wgd = WordGameDictionary("SPDR");
wgd.checkWord(wordToCheck, minimumLength: 3);

Unity

Default usage of the OSPD Dictionary

C#

WordGameDict wgd = new WordGameDict();
wgd.CheckWord(wordToCheck, 3);

UnityScript

var wgd:WordGameDict = WordGameDict();
wgd.checkWord(wordToCheck, 3);

Using a custom dictionary

C#

WordGameDict wgd = new WordGameDict("SPDR.txt");
wgd.CheckWord(wordToCheck, 3);

UnityScript

var wgd:WordGameDict = WordGameDict("SPDR.txt");
wgd.checkWord(wordToCheck, 3);

Java

Coming Soon

C++

Coming Soon

Closing thoughts

Hopefully this library helps simplify your word game development. Let me know if you use it in your game!

Words are powerful, and a masterful use of words can change the world. At the same time, words have a fun side to them too. While the English language often seems to exist purely to confuse us, English also has a silly side that can make us laugh and smile. Are you skeptical? Well, we have dug deep into the English toy box to find a bunch of different ways we can play with words. Fair warning: those that have a low tolerance for dad jokes will want to leave immediately.

Puns

By definition, a pun is a humorous use of a word with multiple meanings or a funny use of a word as a substitute for a similar sounding word. The related terms punning, play on words, and paronomasia are often used to refer to the act of making puns. The term double entendre refers to a type of wordplay that also uses words with multiple meanings, albeit usually in a more risqué manner than a whimsical pun.

Examples of puns

Puns that involve words with multiple meanings:

• The young monkeys went to the jungle gym for some exercise.
• The investor in the bakery demanded a larger piece of the pie.
• The art competition ended in a draw.
• The maestro turned away from the orchestra as they told him the bad news; he couldn’t face the music.

Puns that involve similar sounding words:

• She claimed the big cat was a tiger, but we knew she was lion.
• When he asked me what the flowers should smell like, I told him to use common scents.
• As it turned out, the runners themselves had rigged the race. It was an inside jog.
• The negotiations over the birds went poorly; neither side would give a finch.

Tom Swifty

A Tom Swifty is a fun use of words that follows a quote, usually said by a fictional Tom, using a punny adverb. The term Tom Swifty was coined by writer Willard Espy and named after the Tom Swift series of books, which tended to use a lot of adverbs to describe dialogue.

Examples of Tom Swifties 

• “I have frostbite,” Tom said coldly.
• “I’m stocked on all the essentials,” Jess said needlessly.
• “We feel really bad about what we did,” the children said shamefully.

Stinky Pinky

Stinky pinky, also known as stinky pinkie and by many other names, is a word game in which players try to guess a rhyming phrase based on a definition. The phrase “stinky pinky” itself is a possible answer when playing the game. It is unknown who invented the game or named it, but word games with the name “stinky pinky” can be traced back to at least the 1940s.

Stinky Pinky examples

• Clue: “Stone timepiece”   Answer: Rock clock.
• Clue: “Road pork”   Answer: Street meat.
• Clue: “A young cat’s gloves”   Answer: Kitten’s mittens.

Spoonerisms

A spoonerism is a, usually accidental, swapping of initial sounds of two words. The term spoonerism is named for Oxford lecturer William Archibald Spooner, a notoriously nervous speaker who often swapped the beginnings of words when he spoke publicly.

Spoonerism examples

• It is tinner dime. (“dinner time”)
• He used to work on a bail soat. (“sail boat”)
• Happy dogs love to tag their wails. (“wag their tails”)

Kennings 

A kenning is a metaphorical or poetic phrase that is conventionally used in place of another term.

Kenning examples

• gumshoe = a detective
• pencil pusher = an office worker
• tree-hugger = an environmentalist

Pig Latin

Pig Latin is a form of language, usually used by children, in which the first consonant or consonant sound is placed at the end of a word followed by the sound ā (written as “ay”).

Example: Ancay ouyay eakspay igpay atinlay? (“Can you speak pig Latin?”)

Palindromes

A palindrome is a word, phrase, or sentence that reads the same if read forward or backward.

Palindrome examples

Single words:

• madam
• eve
• noon

Multiple words:

• dog god
• ward draw
• live evil

Sentences:

• A man, a plan, a canal. Panama!
• Madam, I’m Adam!
• Was it a cat I saw?

Anagrams

An anagram is a word, phrase, or sentence formed by rearranging the letters of another.

Anagram examples

• porter is an anagram of report
• attics is an anagram of static
• pub toss is an anagram of bus stop

Antigrams

An antigram is an anagram that means the opposite of the original word or phrase it was formed from.

Examples 

• on the sly is an antigram of honestly
• arise late is an antigram of earliest
• over fifty is an antigram of forty-five

Pangrams

A pangram is a phrase or sentence that includes every letter of the alphabet. The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog is a famous example of a pangram. Some other fun examples of things that rely on alphabet-based challenges include lipograms, heterograms, tautograms, autograms, and kangaroo words.

Ambigrams

An ambigram is a word or visual design that reads the same or creates a new word or image when flipped upside down or reversed. For example, the word dollop is an example of an ambigram because it would still theoretically read as “dollop” even when turned upside down.

Acrostics

An acrostic is a set of lines or verses where certain letters spell out a hidden message.

Example: 

Curious
Agile
Territorial
Smart

Backronyms

A backronym is an existing word turned into an acronym by creating an appropriate phrase that it could serve as an acronym for.

Examples

• Ghost is a backronym of “ghoul haunting our spooky town.”
• Car is a backronym of “carrying all riders.”
• Alligator is a backronym of “a large lizard is grinning at the other reptiles.”

Do you know the difference between an alligator and a crocodile?

Rhyming, alliteration, assonance, and consonance 

These four words all have to do with using words that have similar sounds. Most people are familiar with rhyming, which typically refers to using words with similar-sounding endings as in The big pig ate a fig. The word alliteration means to use words with similar-sounding beginnings or words that start with the same letter. Assonance means to use similar-sounding vowels anywhere in words when rhyming, whereas consonance means to use similar-sounding consonant sounds anywhere in words when making a rhyme.

Alliteration examples

• She sells seashells by the sea shore.
• Big bunnies bounded behind busy birds.
• Ten tenants took twenty tents to Thailand.

Assonance examples

• We see these bees.
• Leave the cleaver for the skeevy beaver.
• Doodle the Cool Poodle wants oodles of noodle strudel.

Consonance examples

• Look! The crook took cook books!
• Ross, toss the sauce to our boss Joss.
• We heard the third nerdy bird’s words.

Ready to play? take the quiz

Now that you know a multitude of ways to have fun with English, keep these terms in your back pocket with our handy word list. You can take advantage of flashcards, spelling quizzes, and more. Then, put on your party hat and have some fun with our quiz on all these types of word play!

The dictionary that is used to provide an
educational and entertaining experience in our word game is custom-built. This
page describes how existing tools have been used to assemble word sets from
available texts, which are matched with definitions from WordNet. Because the
game needs to accommodate players ranging from people who are learning English
as a second language to native speakers, we have tried to make word sets in 10
vocabulary levels. Also, we investigate the possibility of creating ‘themed’
dictionaries, for added entertainment value, but also to learn the jargon for a
specific domain.

Assembling the word sets manually seems
mind-numbing work. Therefore, we chose to write a Python script to automate most routine tasks. This script makes use
of the Natural Language Toolkit (NLTK) to
process existing texts. Natural Language
Processing with Python (Bird, Loper, & Klein, 2009) was used as a
guidebook. The script does not fully automate the dictionary assembly, but is
rather used from the interactive python terminal.

It is possible to use this script for your
own experimentation. Because it depends on NLTK, please ensure that you have
installed the nltk module, and that it is working in python. The script is available for download as buildDicts.py at the bottom of this page.

Initial processing

The assembly of word sets starts with
compiling a frequency table for the words in an existing text. Our assumption
is that words that are commonly used in texts are most useful to learn for
beginning leaners, and that the rarer words will provide a challenge even for
native speakers. The texts that we use have already  been split up into ‘entities which might be
words’: tokens. NLTK provides
tokenizers that enable the use of other text files.

Not all tokens in a text are, however,
useful to include in the dictionary. A common problem is the occurrence of
plural forms of nouns and conjugated verbs. One possible process of converting
similar tokens to one canonical word form is stemming: stripping affixes from a word until the stem is left.
This is applied widely in search engines, but for our purposes it introduces
the problem of removing too many characters from a word. Therefore, we apply lemmatization (see nltk), which checks
if the stemmed version of a word is present in a basic English dictionary. If
it is, the stemmed version is returned; if not, the original version is
preserved.

This is implemented in the mkList()
function, which takes a list of tokens as an input, and returns a frequency
distribution table and a simple list of the same words, both ordered by
frequency. It applies lemmatization before the frequency distribution table is
made. Afterwards, the table is looped through to apply additional criteria for
relevant words. Any token that contains non-alphabetical characters, or is
shorter than three characters is not considered a word. The remaining words are
also ignored if they are present in NLTK’s list of stopwords (commonly used,
uninformative words), or in the lists of male and female names.

Tools

We call the remaining functions in the
script tools, because they are used from the terminal by a dictionary builder.
Assembling good word sets for the dictionary is a trial-and-error process,
which requires much fine-tuning. Not all tools are necessarily used to assemble
a word set.

The printDict() function takes the frequency
table from initial processing as an input. For each word, it searches for all
possible meanings in WordNet. If any meanings for the word are found, the word
is printed, followed by the definition for each of the found meanings. This is
the method that we initially used to process (sections of) the frequency table
into word sets. However, the results were dissapointing because it still
included various verb conjugations, and provided a confusingly long list of
definitions for ambigous words. It’s primary use now is for testing purposes.

A slightly more advanced method for
printing definitions has been implemented in prTokDict(). It uses the list of
words from the initial processing, since it is more easily processable than the
frequency table. Instead of searching for all possible meanings of a word,
WordNet is selectively searched for meanings that match a single
part-of-speech, such as noun or verb. To select a single word form for verbs,
only the gerund form is used. The full decision tree for printing definitions is visualized in the flowchart below.

Two additional functions can be useful in
word selections. In the higher vocabulary levels, it is interesting to filter
out any words that are quite common in the English language, but which occur
rarely in the inputted text. The unusualWords() function compares a list of
words against a basic English dictionary, and returns the words that are not
present in the dictionary.

Because many books and text corpora will
contain many more words than are needed to assemble word sets, a final function
was written to select segments from a word list. The function sampleDefs()
iterates through a word list by selecting a segment of a certain size, printing
it with prTokDict(), and skipping a certain number of words before selecting
the next segment. This can be used to produce a representative sample from a
larger word list, to use as a word set, or just for testing purposes.

The methods described on this page produce
word sets for the game that are of a playable quality. However, to assemble
word sets that can be clearly recognized as belonging to a certain theme, more
advanced techniques are necessary. We have created word sets from Lewis
Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland and from
the King James Bible (available for download below). These sets are
somewhat recognizable as children’s/fantasy and religious, but still include
many words that could have been in any generic set. To make more interesting
themed sets, it might be possible to use the tf-idf metric, which
is commonly used in information retrieval as a measure of how characteristic a
word is for a certain document.

Reference(s)

Bird, S., Loper, E., and Klein, E. (2009). Natural Language Processing with Python.
Sausalito, CA, USA: O’Reilly Media Inc.

I want to make a word game based around Russian language (for reasons). I don’t really know the language, but that shouldn’t stop me as long as I have the right resources. For this game to work, I would need at least a Russian Scrabble dictionary. I’m not particularly looking for a piece of software (unless it is a ready to use JavaScript library), but rather a free resource that I can incorporate for offline use in the game.

In the past I used JMdict/EDICT Japanese-English dictionary for similar purpose, but I assume there might be no Russian-English equivalent. I also used a simple Polish Scrabble dictionary (that was basically a text file with the words separated by new line characters). Surly something like this must exist for Russian language as well?. I wasn’t able to find anything myself. It might have be the fact google results are too localized, but more likely it’s just me not knowing the language. I would really appreciate some help.