iPhone Game Review: Bookworm from PopCap Games

PopCap Games has announced that its Bookworm word building game has come to the iPhone.

Based on the PC game, this version includes several features unique to the iPhone including "shake to scramble", a bonus bookshelf of various themed words and a progress report accessed by turning the phone sideways.

With the similar basic concept as Boggle or Scramble -- building words from adjoining tiles -- Bookworm is different in that it's played on a staggered grid so that each letter has six neighbours, and when a letter has been used it disappears, allowing letters above to drop down.

In addition, Bookworm introduces a number of bonus and "fire" tiles. Bonus tiles offer additional points, and are formed after interesting and/or long words. Fire tiles, on the other hand, tend to appear after a run of short words, and gradually drop towards the bottom of the board. If they reach the bottom without being extinguished (by using them in a word) then the library burns down and the game is over.

There are two game play versions. The classic game has no time limit so you can take longer to look for words, while the timed game hurries you along with the frequent addition of fire tiles that drop without warning and must be quickly dealt with in order to progress.

The bonus bookshelf encourages players to find various sets of words, like colours, or foods, or items of clothing. The first time you play, though, you don't get to see what the different sets are until you find the first word, then you can see all ten words.

The game has been designed to be child-friendly, with cute graphics, although younger children may struggle to accurately build words as the playing grid, though intuitive, is quite small.

Bizarrely, though the game claims to use "most" of the Oxford English Dictionary, a number of words are missing. I'm not talking obscure words, either. "BEEN", for example, isn't classed as a legal word. A nice educational touch, though, is that some words offer up their definition.

It's an entertaining game both for the odd five minutes here and there, and for those who get seriously involved in these types of games (namely, me). The shape and action of the board make it a worthy alternative to the likes of Boggle, and the scoring and levelling up add to the enjoyment.

For £2.99 it's not at all bad.

Bookworm (iTunes Store link)

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