Rating: 
Summary: Don't play without it
Review: The OSPD is no ordinary dictionary. There are capsule definitions given but no usage tips. All the entries are in caps. Since there are no proper names allowed, this doesn't matter. The most important information about the entries (from the point of view of the Scrabble player) is how they are spelled, how they are made plural, how the gerund and past tenses are formed, and whether you can make comparatives or superlatives out of the word and how.For example the plural of "bijou" (a jewel) is either "bijoux" or "bijous," and the OSPD gives that info. The gerund of "snib" (to latch) is "snibbing" while the comparative of "sleazy" is "sleazier" and the superlative, "sleaziest." There is also the adverb, "sleazily." The -er form of a word is listed separately. If you don't find it, it's not a word!--or at least that should be our agreement. For example "renown" is a noun and a verb but there is no "renowner"--"someone who makes renown" since the verb is intransitive, but there is a "tearer"--"one who tears." (There's also a "terror," but never mind.) By the way, words beginning with the prefix "re" as in, e.g., "reword" are listed separately from words that begin with the "re" that is not a prefix. Again, "renown" is not listed after "rename" but follows "renovate" a few pages later. The other peculiarities of the entries are explained in the Introduction, which I highly recommend you read. (Be sure your informed opponent has read it!) There it is explained why "You should look always look at several entries above and below the expected place..." when searching for the word in question. You should also read the brief Preface in which the editors explain why some offensive (especially four-letter) words do not appear. Note too that words longer than eight letters (and indeed one-letter words) do not appear (except for some inflected forms) because they are seldom if ever used in a Scrabble game. Of course most veteran players have on occasion played a very nice nine-letter, double triple-word, 50-point bonus word. I did myself once. I wish I could remember what it was. For casual players, who typically use a collegiate dictionary to settle spelling disputes, the contents of this little green book will come as something of a shock. You mean "zax" is a word? How about "zek"? Can you believe "jefe"? This is just to name three off hand that are not in the Random House college dictionary I have in front of me. There are in fact in the OSPD seven words beginning with a "q" not followed by a "u" (qaid, qanat, qat, qindar, qintar, qiviut, and qoph--in case you're in the middle of a game). Don't laugh. In some households there is a Scrabble game going on at all times just as in some other households the TV is always on. Random House's college dictionary doesn't give "qaid" or "qanat" but surprisingly has "qadi" which is not given by the OSPD. I think Scrabble has influenced dictionary compilers because if you look at the Merriam-Webster (the same company that produces the OSPD) Ninth Collegiate (copyright 1985) you will find only qintar, qiviut and qoph. But even more tellingly if you look at Merriam-Webster's Second International Unabridged Dictionary (I have the edition of 1950), the Grand Dame of American dictionaries, you will find that there are no words beginning with a "q" not followed by a "u": no "qat," no "qintar," no "qoph," etc. With so much variation between dictionaries, the good folks at Merriam-Webster saw a need and filled it. Most people I know play "house rules" and rely on the dictionary(ies) that happen to be in residence. My recommendation is that you buy two of these green books, one in paperback to take with you when you take your Scrabble game on the road, and another in hardback to have at home. Of course if you haven't used this book before it will take some getting used to. But buy a Scrabble software program and practice with this book at hand, and after some time you will find that, with all those extra words to play with, you can really rack up the points! One other thing to realize is that some of the spellings and even some of the words in the OSPD are really not standard anymore and should not be considered part of the so-called "Standard English" that we all read and (usually) speak. This fact does not detract from the utility of the OSPD for Scrabble players; however, as other reviewers have pointed out, when writing a term paper use a "real" dictionary. In short, it is not the plentiful number of Scrabble-type words that appear in this dictionary that makes it so valuable--although that is certainly one of its best features. It is rather the definitive way the OSPD demonstrates exactly how different forms of words are spelled, something not always done in your average dictionary. The OSPD is most valuable because it settles spelling disputes in a quick and unambiguous manner, and that alone is reason enough to buy this book.
Rating: 
Summary: Great if you like to cheat
Review: This book has so many made-up words that it makes Scrabble EASY, too easy for my tastes. I bought the deluxe Scrabble board game & this dictionary, being new to Scrabble, I bluffed on numerous 2 and 3 letter words & this dictionary almost always came through for me on my made up words. Not much liking to win by cheating, I checked other dictionaries to validate the words, but many couldn't be found anywhere else but in this Scrabble version. I'm not sure that is a good thing. Often when playing Scrabble, tiring of this book, we instead use the (3-book-set by) Merriam Dictionary instead to make the game more challenging.
So it is difficult to rate this book--it depends on whether one enjoys cheating or as I do, prefers a challenge. It's a great book for beginner Scrabble players to use who have a limited vocabulary--pretty much any word you can make up is in this book.
Ex: chare, bis, bleb, mair, etc.
Rating: 
Summary: Works but breaks
Review: This book is designed for Scrabble and Upwords. It's good for content, not complete, but good. The publication itself wears out quickly however. Cover stock is lightweight, paper is thin and tears easily. But, it's the only one of its kind on the market.
Rating:
Summary: can't argue the athourity
Review: this book is ESSENTIAL for any hard-core scrabble player. from "aa" to "zyzzyva" it has everything you need for challenges and everything else.
Rating:
Summary: Essential
Review: This dictionary is an essential reference for any serious or even frequent Scrabble player.
The biggest advantage of this particular dictionary is that it standardizes what is acceptable when playing. Anyone who has ever played without an agreement on what constitutes the acceptable words knows that there are far too many dictionaries out there to easily agree upon one without an official one such as this.
That being said, it is not a dictionary that one can use to get definitions of words. Many times it will only define one usage of a word even when there are others as its purpose is to define what is acceptable in Scrabble play.
It is invaluable in terms of listing words that a regular Scrabble player needs to know such as two letter words, 'Q' words that don't require a 'U', etc.
One who is a frequent player will probably want to supplement this by getting a list of two letter words from the National Scrabble Association. That is definitely a good idea as it would be very difficult to be a very competent player without knowing all of those.
This dictionary does list countless words that a player may need in different situations such as qat, suq, zyzzyva, etc.
It certainly does need to be updated. There are lots of words that have become commonplace in recent years that are not in this such as spam, email, blog, latte, etc.
It is still the best out there for Scrabble players and is really an essential for playing the game.
Rating: 
Summary: Not Official, Not a Dictionary, Not Scrabble, Not for School
Review: This dictionary, OSPD for short, was first compiled nearly three decades ago. It was a compendium of all words found in any of five college dictionaries of that era, which predates computer-assisted lexicography. One of them went out of print soon after. Some, but not all, more recent editions of the remaining four have provided new entries for subsequent editions of the OSPD. As the current OSPD is about a decade old, quite possibly it lacks the new words from any college dictionary's latest edition. Furthermore, at least two new college-style dictionaries have entered the marketplace, and one of the old ones is reliably reported to have fired all its lexicographers. This is no longer the official source used in clubs and tournaments. Their official wordlist includes about 200 forms ranging from what is mildly offensive mainly in lexicographic circles (e.g.: libber, peeing) to extremely offensive (the f-word, the n-word, etc.). The latest printing of the paperback OSPD, 3rd edition, has silently deleted about a dozen forms (da, skiwears, etc.) to make it less unofficial, though at the cost of making it slightly incompatible with earlier printings that your neighbors might use. It's not a dictionary. Definitions are often so incomplete that you cannot even use this book to check spellings. Pronunciations are non-existent. It is sometimes not straightforward to find what is listed, so that REGLOW is present, though it appears several pages before REGMA. The overwhelming majority of people who enjoy Scrabble want to know more about words than this opuscule provides. Whether it's Scrabble is a thornier question. Most people tend to regard Scottish words as foreign words not acceptable under the rules. With this dictionary you don't even have the opportunity to reject Scotticisms, since they're not marked. And there are a lot of them, the majority from that 30-year-old out-of-print dictionary, which hadn't been thoroughly revised in at least 60 years. On the other hand, fewer than half the Scottish words you might find in a Scottish-English literary work are present, and still fewer of the Scottish words found in a typical Scottish-language website. (I refer to Scottish, not Gaelic.) Most people think that Scrabble words should be spelled correctly, yet many OSPD entries reflect spellings no longer found in dictionaries, some of which appeared only briefly in only one of the five college dictionaries which were consulted in one or more printings to form this book. Nearly all English words had a variety of spellings before civilization settled on a correct one. In particular, some sixty years ago scientists agreed internationally on the spellings of certain technical terms, thereby rejecting spellings (such as chlorin and chlorid) that still abound in the OSPD, even though they disappeared from the better dictionaries long ago and have for the most part disappeared even from the dictionaries from which they were taken thirty years ago. Some OSPD words are immediately suspect, such as et as in "I et my supper". You can find this in precisely one currently available college dictionary. You won't be able to check most suspect words in whatever dictionary you happen to own, since they're found in only one of the various editions consulted, often not the most recent printing. In other words the very lexicographers who originally included the suspect word often rejected it for a future printing. Skilless, outcavil, miseat, toadless, afars, ..., the list seems endless. I certainly wouldn't recommend this book for schools, or any place where children might be present! I recognize that spelling and grammar are not as highly regarded as they used to be, but if a child's first exposure is to the spelling janty (unused for a couple of centuries and found only in the out-of-print 1973 dictionary) then the standard jaunty will always seem strange. And similarly for hundreds or thousands of other examples. In fact, based on a partial survey, I would estimate that 5% of the OSPD words cannot be found in any current dictionary. This includes a number of short words that will appear on virtually every gameboard if you choose OSPD. Even two-letter words such as al, es, de (as in Charles de Gaulle), and a couple others are in the 5%. On the other hand, once you use OSPD for a while you will be accustomed to seeing informal words, so the absence of perp will astonish you. The eminently useful word qi may well be familiar to you from real life and is probably in whatever current college dictionary you may own (and even for Scrabble you must have such a dictionary to check on words longer than 8 letters), but it's not in OSPD. This work was last revised about a decade ago and you might as well wait for an up-to-date version, though since it is unofficial, a new edition may be further away than the long-awaited 4th Unabridged. The best that can be said for this book is that your regular college dictionary is unlikely to provide any basis for accepting vainest and plainer while rejecting mainer and mainest, or for drawing a line somewhere in a list such as stupider, rapider, vapider, hispider. The OSPD line may not always be sensible: e.g., exactly one of positiver and negativer is acceptable, and loudlier is one of five comparative -ly adverbs. So if this sort of issue is one you cannot resolve in any other way, you may want this book, especially if you agree to use only a standard dictionary for browsing. I would nonetheless recommend using a standard college dictionary for Scrabble. The American Heritage High School Dictionary apparently contains everything in the College edition except for words that provoke offense, so it would be suitable for school use. If your friends and neighbors use some other dictionary for Scrabble, that should only increase the variety the game affords so long as you treat the matter sensibly.
Rating: 
Summary: Censored and misguided
Review: This is a seriously misguided edition. Words which appeared in the First and Second editions but are now considered "likely to offend" have been eliminated. This means that some of the oldest words in the English language have been erased, even though the rules of Scrabble expressly permit archaic and slang terms. Merriam-Webster's job is not that of moral arbiter and if they thought it important to have a version suitable for children, then they should have released a separate children's edition, rather than mutilating the adults' one.
Rating:
Summary: Helpful but...
Review: This was a very helpfull book that lets you play scrabble better. Even though, when your playing for fun and you use it the game gets boring, so i use it only when i really need it. Still, a great buy.
Rating:
Summary: How to use that "Q"
Review: Thousands of words at your fingertips-learn how to use the "Q" when you can't get a "U". Offers the "official" list of acceptable words but abbreviations and foreign words abound (seemingly against the written rules for Scrabble), while words like "reminiscent" are missing. Good for expanding your play choices but can't be relied on as the only dictionary in the game.
Rating:
Summary: The one and only
Review: What more is there to say? A must have if you play anything other than the most rudimentary game. We also use this book as the definitive source for Big Boggle (which, by the way, for you word game afficionados, has been reissued after being unavailable for many years).
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