Game Review: Wordrix

Who doesn't love a good word game? No one. Why? Probably because most everyone can play them. However not every word game is so great and there are plenty of duds floating around in the world as we know it. Fortunately we usually find some pretty good word games for Windows Phone like the excellent Wordament. Now under our most critical eye is another word game from Haylex Studios called Wordrix. Unsurprisingly Wordrix is very similar in core gameplay to Wordament and on first impression we wrote it off as a generic word grid game. As we spent more time with it though, we realized maybe Wordrix was on to something more. For our full thoughts and score of the game, continue past the break.

The Basics
Like we said, Wordrix is setup in a similarly way as Wordament's core gameplay but for those who don't know we'll run through the basics. After you start a game, you're presented with a 5x5 grid of random letters and the main objective is to drag your finger across letters in order to create words for which you're awarded points. The bigger or more obscure the word, the more points you get. However things start to deviate from here as Wordrix makes things simultaneously easier and harder. Unlike Wordament, your game board actually changes everytime you find words because the letters you used are eliminated and new words drop in their place. Think of it as a mix of Scrabble and Bejeweled and you'll get the idea. Of course this can make things easier once you run into a roadblock with your original grid, but it also can make things harder because there is less control over the presence of consonants and letters you may need. If you overuse your vowels, you could be stuck with an impossible game board and a slowly ticking clock.

So aside from the basics, you also get two main game modes: Classic Race the Clock and Score Sprints. The former will pit you against the clock as you race to find as many words as you possibly can while the latter sets a predetermined score limit and you have to compete for the fastest time. Then there's the online play mode called The Arena in which every user is given the same board and you compete for the highest score within a two-minute limit. Speaking of online, the game also supports leaderboards both locally and globally across the web. Another method of squeezing out more replay value from your Wordrix experience are the inclusion of achievements which work just like Xbox Live games except they are tied to your Wordrix username. As you can tell, Wordrix comes packed with a ton of content for the price...but how much of it did we enjoy?

Think of it as a mix of Scrabble and Bejeweled and you'll get the idea.

The Good
Undoubtedly one of the biggest draws for Wordrix is how much you're getting. Haylex Studios has bundled in a lot of goodies for a non-XBL game and for a price that's significantly less too. The best part is that all of the features actually contribute to the enjoyment of the game, and we only wish more developers could stuff in this many features without losing what made their game so great in the first place. Of course the gameplay is the most important part of a game and Wordrix doesn't disappoint. There's a reason we enjoyed Wordament and the same applies to Wordrix's frantic fun, but we also enjoy the new mechanic of letters being eliminated which significantly increases the risks of running into a brick wall before you reach your limit. Speaking of, those limits are found in multiple game types and that's yet another flexibility the game offered that we really enjoyed. Plus Haylex Studios has informed us that a future update may bring up to two more new game modes to try, which is great to hear as it contributes more variety. The online component is phenomenal as well, as The Arena and global leaderboards make for a lot of fun when you're in the mood to compete against your Windows Phone peers.

The Bad
The one significant negative of the game was the very same thing that makes it so much fun--the elimination of letters from the game board. It's bad enough when you can't think of words to make, but when you literally run out of letters that can be used to make a word it's extremely frustrating. What's more confusing though, is that the game lacks any sort of screen that tells you, "No more words! You lose", or something similar like Bejeweled does. If the game added that feature it would help significantly, but as it stands it is the most disappointing aspect of Wordrix. Another negative is the presentation of the game which, while nice, we found to be a little too 'basic' for us. A splash of personality into the interface would really help, and while the game includes multiple themes we never found them to be too visually appealing. Besides that we found that some areas of the game were much less responsive to the touch than others, like the Achievements and Instructions screen which were extremely laggy when scrolling with your finger.

Conclusion
We gave Wordament a 9. We're going to give Wordrix a 9 too, although we really feel the work Haylex Studios has done outranks the You vs. The Internet hit. How? It's all in the options, and Wordrix comes packed with them. Offering similar gameplay offline along with more configurable game modes makes the experience much more enjoyable. The robust added features like achievements and leaderboards also makes things obvious that the developer is committed to offering a great experience instead of just a quick buck. In the end though, that's really all it costs for the ad-free version: a buck! Haylex Studios is even more generous than that and has offered up the full game for free thanks to ad support. With promises to add more game modes and features in the near future, Wordrix is a wise investment for any Windows Phone gamer and we highly recommend you check it out.