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Smart Box Design's WordPop!
Smartbox Design’s WordPop! 1.0.1 As Windows Mobile devices have matured, so have the applications that run on them. Games, often overlooked in the Windows Mobile arena, have grown as well with advanced graphics and multi-level strategy games becoming commonplace. While all this has made the game play more entertaining, it is hard to deny the fun of some of the more basic games available. Smartbox Design has developed such a game in WordPop!. WordPop! is a word game where users spell words to eliminate tiles and advance to ever increasingly difficult levels. The game, a combination of Scrabble and Boggle, gives players points for the various letters used in a word. The more letters used in the word, the more points are scored. The object is to eliminate all the tiles on each level so as to advance to the next level. While it sounds simple, WordPop! is challenging at all levels and extremely difficult on its most advanced level. It is that challenge that keeps WordPop! entertaining and one of the best games money can buy for Windows Mobile owners. WordPop! is installed via ActiveSync and occupies approximately 1.2MB of storage space. The game can be installed in the devices main memory or on a Storage Card. Once installed and started, WordPop!’s menu is shown allowing players to select the level of difficulty of the game as well as a link on how to play the game (Figure 1). In the playing field (Figure 2), the letter squares occupy a 6-by-6 tile area with the bonus tiles in the 3 tile window on the right side of the screen. The difficulty level adjusts the number of these bonus tiles that are available to the player during game play. On the easy level, for example, the player will receive three blank tiles that can be used throughout the game to complete words. Remember the ultimate object is it eliminates all of the tiles on the screen to advance to the next level. The bonus tiles are replenished when players clear a level or when a word equaling 40 points or more is achieved (on the Easy level. More points are required at the Medium and Hard levels).
The process of creating words are done by tapping the letter tiles in the correct spelling order in the playing field then tapping the checkmark button. Players will know which letters they have selected by the color change from white to yellow the tiles make when selected (Figure 3). When the checkmark is tapped, the created word is “popped” from the screen and tiles above the eliminated word shift down, creating no opportunities for words – or eliminating them if a wrong move is made (Figure 4)!
After playing a level for a few minutes, it is possible that tiles will end up being separated from each other, making it impossible to spell a word and eliminate tiles (Figure 5). To get around this, players can tap the rotate button above the checkmark button to turn the playing field by a quarter turn. This reshuffles the tiles, making it possible to create words (Figure 6). Once all of the tiles are eliminated from the playing field, the game advances to the next level and the playing field is reset with a new set of letter tiles.
The level continues until no further words are able to be found a new game is selected off of the Game menu. If the player has achieved a top ten high scores, they are prompted for their name (Figure 7) and their score is displayed along with the other top scores (Figure 8). Lastly, the player is show the top point scoring words of the game with words from the just played game being in bold text (Figure 9).
The game play of WordPop! is excellent and addictive, even for non-word game players. It is responsive even on an average Windows Mobile device and is easy to read and play. It would be easy to lump WordPop! into the same category as Scrabble or Boggle but avid players will quickly see that it has many more facets that these traditional board games. The only lacking part of WordPop! is its dictionary. During test playing, I found it did not know some words such as “druid” and “tunneled”. Given that the product is still in version 1.0.1, I’m confident this aspect of the game will improve with time. The support from Smart Box Design is outstanding with email questions replied to within an hour on each test message sent. The Smart Box Design website, http://www.smartboxdesign.com also has game FAQs and is easy to navigate. WordPop! sells for $14.95 and is available directly from the Smart Box Design website. A limited trial of the game is available on the site as well.
Clinton
Fitch
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