Wordox: Word Snatcher Review

We all love the classic word-based boardgame Scrabble, don't we? At least, we all think it's a good idea to play it after a couple of drinks with the family, then after five minutes immediately begin to regret it when desperation kicks in and the arguments flare. "Can abbreviations or brand names be used?" "Is there really an animal in Africa called a 'zumbu'?" "Why can't we use German words (I'm one third German and a quarter Austrian, after all!)?"

That kind of thing.

Let's face it, Scrabble's torn more families apart than adultery and alcoholism ever will. So here we have a mobile version from Vivendi, stripped to its core and pitted against a strict timer. Does it still do siblings asunder? You bet, and it can make you pretty angry with your beloved handset, too.

That's not to say Wordox doesn't sport a hefty share of fun when the letters are going your way, but the real problem is that when a word gets rejected, there's no arguing your point. If it's not in the game's dictionary, tough – and that's an inherent and unavoidable pitfall in any electronic version of the age old word game.

Individual scores for each letter have been dropped, so 'quixotic' isn't going to bag you the high scores anymore. Instead, it's simply a point for each letter of an acceptable word placed on the board.

The usual method of crossing over an existing line of letters is still required, but the double and triple scoring squares have also been replaced. In Wordox we have orange and pink squares, instead. Covering an orange square puts an 'orange point' in reserve, while covering a pink square adds any accumulated orange points to your score and clears the board for the next round.

The objective is very simple – reach a predetermined score (say, 25) and you've won. But the real challenge is in the game system's AI, which feels uncomfortably biased, awarding itself dubious combinations such as 'ma', 'yea', 'uta', 'ya', 'resay', 'jee', 'ar', 'yo' and 'azote' (all seen within the first five minutes of play, and all failing a cross check against Encarta Dictionary).

It's still rewarding when you manage to place a 'Q', 'Z' or 'X', but because that personal achievement goes unrewarded – unless it happens to cross a pink square by chance – Wordox feels distinctly one-sided. The multiplayer mode, which caters for up to four players, significantly relieves the frustration of a computer controlled game, but the tussle with the rather obscure internal dictionary still remains.

A decent enough abbreviation of Scrabble for crossword and word puzzle fans, then, but anyone looking for light relief might well find themselves more wound up than entertained.