Build words in order to prevent the board from filling! Any time contiguous tiles form an English word, they break. At the beginning of the game, 100 lettered tiles are pre-shuffled behind the scenes, and then are provided one-at-a-time for your strategic usage. All of the words in Portmanteau’s dictionary are between 3 and 7 letters in length, and within the length constraints, nearly any valid Scrabble word is also valid in Portmanteau. Any tiles that touch (vertically or horizontally) are read together as a word, and a word can be built from the bottom-up, top-down, left-to-right, or right-to-left. As more words are broken, the level increases, along with a score bonus multiplier. Longer words composed of rarer letters (e.g., ‘pizzazz’) yield higher scores than simpler words. As tiles are affected by gravity, it is possible to break a chain of words in sequence for an additional bonus. The level increases as more words are broken, and the base word score is multiplied by the current level before being added to the total score. Occasionally, the player is given an opportunity to choose the letter of a "blank" drop tile. This can facilitate the completion of complex words. When the board is nearly full, the ability to replace an existing tile is sometimes given instead. Such a replacement has the potential to salvage an otherwise-blocked area of the board.