Scrabble 3 Complete Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)This version of Scrabble not only allows the expected muli-player games and games against the computer at various skill levels, but also allows games between computers on a local area network, as well as over the Internet. The built-in dictionary is good, although it's missing a some words (e.g., ki, kis, qi & qis) that are included in the Merriam-Webster Official Scrabble Players' Dictionary, 4th Edition. As near as I can tell, 166,184 of the 267,751 words recognized by SOWPODS (anagram of two acronyms: OSW (Official Scrabble Words) OSPD (Official Scrabble Players Dictionary) - the word list used in tournament Scrabble in most countries except the USA, Thailand and Canada) are in the Scrabble Complete Dictionary. Too bad, definitions are not included; so you should still have a dictionary handy. There is a custom dictionary capability and it seems to work except for a bug: if you give it words of 15 characters (more can't fit across a Scrabble board), when it reviews the custom dictionary (described in the manual), it will strip off the last characters causing it to accept any resulting miss-spellings. The Internet and network play features work fine, but do not allow more than one player on each computer. I have not tried to see if it allows a network game that includes connections on both Internet and network. I have not had any problems running the program under Windows 98, Windows 2000 Professional, Windows XP Home Edition or Windows XP Professional. There appears to be a minor bug in the video driver when switching back to it using Alt+Tab, but if the Scrabble screen doesn't come back, just use the mouse to paint it back (you'll see what I mean if you experience it). Too bad the game doesn't use a Window instead of full screen only. Even if it has been installed on the computer, you must have the CD in a drive to start the game. Once the game is started, the CD can (but need not) be removed. The overall menu system is a bit clumsy. You must often first click on your selection, making it yellow, and then on Okay (2 clicks, where one would have sufficed). The program also has a chat and sound capability for network and Internet use that is cute.

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Boggle/Upwords/Hangman Word Hunter Collection Review

Average Reviews:

(More customer reviews)I usually shy away from Valuesoft, but what a pleasant surprise here! No problems installing the collection on my XP system, no noticeable bugs, thoughtful options... and some great games! For this price, you can't go wrong if you like word games.
In my opinion, Upwords is the clear pick of the litter. Extremely addictive! While the game can be played the classic way, several options allow you to spice it up: unlimited tile stacking (instead of the usual 5-tile high), colored tiles (where letter tiles are of different colors, and forming words in the same color doubles your points), time limit, etc. I found the AI to be a decent opponent, even though I didn't know some of the words it used. Another nice touch is that the game displays your current word(s) score before you commit to it -- and if one of the words shown has a score of zero, it means it's not in the game's dictionary.
Boggle is fun too. You can play it solitaire, or with AI player(s), and with or without a time limit. The board can be the classic 4x4 cubes, the Big 5x5 cubes board, or the Mega board with 6x6 cubes. Here again, several options allow you to modify the standard play to spice things up (multi-use letters, disallow "s" plurals, minimum word length, and more).
Word Hunter is similar to a game called Super Text Twist. Your are given 8 letters forming an anagram, and a certain amount of words to find between 3 to 8 letters. I found the game quite entertaining. Perfect for a quick game if you don't have time for something more meaty.
Hangman didn't hold my attention very long, but maybe younger players would enjoy it. One option lets you change the classic hangman character into a spider -- with 8 legs, it allows for more wrong guesses. Other options allows you to make the game more difficult, for instance by disallowing vowel guesses.
Pros:
- Infinite replay value.
- Single player, multiplayer hotseat/network/LAN (haven't tried any multiplayer games yet)
- Adjustable AI players difficulty.
- Music and/or sound effects can be turned off.
- Can be played without the CD in the drive.
- According to my CD, it's compatible with Windows Vista too.
Cons:
- Can't save a game in progress (not a big deal, although it would have been nice for Upwords).
- Can't edit the dictionary used by the game (Upwords refused the word "zen" for instance, which I found irritating).
- None of the games save high scores.
All in all, a great value for very entertaining games (Upwords alone is worth it!)

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