WORD SPIN

There has always been the appeal of word style games since the invention of
the board game. Heck, it probably started way before that in some cave with two
people making words on a wall with charcoal. With the invention of mobile
gaming, those of us who enjoy a word game on the go could do much worse.

Word SPIN, available on the iPhone or iPod touch is not quite what you may
think. In the game, you are tasked with taking a number of spinning wheels
numbering three to eight and lining up as many words as possible then locking
the wheels. Once the wheels have been locked, you can spin the whole machination
and find the words that line up. I found it best to make a word with the
independently spinning wheels worth as many points as possible, locking the
whole thing down and then hoping my luck would provide many smaller words to
help boost my score.

Much like the board game Scrabble, each letter is worth a different amount of
points, vowels are worth nothing. The idea is to rack up as high a score as
possible over several rounds of play. Now the thing about this title is that
there is some pretty liberal use of words here. Nothing dirty mind you, but many
of them are two letter words and some are some words I have never heard of. You
know this because at the end of the round the game gives you a list of
potentially missed words and what their value would have been.

So you find a word in your giant letter tube looking thing and then you
rotate it to the middle of the screen and tap the letters in order from left to
right. By double tapping the last letter of the word the score comes up and is
added to your total. However if you pick a word that is not really a word, then
you lose points instead. And trust me when I say that there is an eclectic
collection of words available in this title. I have never heard of the word "ee"
before. And yet, its one that I apparently missed.

My other beef with Word SPIN is that when you think you are done finding all
the words, you tap a small window at the top of the screen. This location is so
frustrating that on more then one occasion I ended the round completely on
accident causing me to get a low score. It almost would have been better if
there was a "back" button for when this happens, or a window that pops in saying
"are you really sure you want to end this round?" Something, anything would have
been helpful.

There are three modes to play; practice, which is exactly that, you can chose
how many dials you want and then get down with the spelling. The second mode is
the "solitaire" mode which is just a way to play through the game’s leveling
system, progressively trying to beat your high score. When this is done, you can
post it online and try and make the local leaderboard (or global) and score mad
props from your other word junkies. Lastly there is a challenge mode where you
can actually send the word puzzle to another player and go at it head to head,
even if it means playing over a great deal of time where each player gets an
opportunity to complete the round.

Graphically, the game is pretty solid, clean lines, easy to read letters and
words, exactly what one would expect from this type of app. Control wise, the
touch screen can betray you (as mentioned above) and my wife did get frustrated
several times with the game’s controls. The audio is simply a non-issue. The
game clicks and makes noise, but it really doesn’t even make a difference in the
game.

Gameplay: 7.0
This is a game that can frustrate you when you slip up, but for the most
part gets things done.

Graphics: 6.5
For what it is, the game is fine.

Sound: 5.0
The noise the game makes is simply non-inclusive (does that make sense). I
played with headphones and without headphones. It was the same experience either
way.

Difficulty: Hard
If you truly want to master this game, you need to be a word wizard. I have
only gotten ALL of the words in a single round a handful of times. The people on
the leaderboards clearly don’t miss a thing.

Concept: 7.0
For two bucks, the game is a no-brainer for those who are into word games.
Good idea, can be frustrating to get really good at it.

Multiplayer: 6.5
The multiplayer in this title is way different from anything you may have
done before. You could play your round, and your challenge friend may play her
round tomorrow at noon.

Overall: 6.6
A decent attempt at capturing some word magic from PC users. I have certainly
gotten my money’s worth of the title, and then some.