Letterpress is a brand new word game from developer Atebits. I’ve been getting into word games lately because my wife is a big fan of them. I will admit however that compared to her, I’m not very good at them and she beats me maybe 99.9% of the time. I still enjoy playing them because it’s something I can play with my wife. With that said, Letterpress is a fun take on the classic word making game. It’s very similar to games like Boggle in which you are presented with a grid of letters and must make words out of them. The rules are a lot different though and because the game is multiplayer only, there is a lot of strategy involved when trying to win the game.

To start a game, you need to link up your Game Center with it. Choose one of your friends and send them a game request. You start off with a 5×5 grid of letters. Unlike games like Boggle, you can actually choose letters from anywhere on the board to make a word. They do not need to be adjacent to each other. Now this is where the strategy part comes in. You can block certain letters on the board if you surround that letter with adjacent letters. That means that now, the other player cannot score any points from those letters or steal them from you as long as they are blocked. What they can do however is use the adjacent letters to unblock the letter for the next round.

Scoring is pretty simple in this game as well. You get 1 point for every letter you use in your word as long as you don’t already occupy that letter. You only get points for new letters used or using your opponents letters. If you use your opponent’s letters, you steal 1 point for every letter you take from them. That too is where strategy comes in as you try to make letters that steal more of your opponent’s points.

Overall, I really enjoy Letterpress. It’s a back and forth tug of war and just when you think you are winning, your lead could disappear in a the blink of an eye. There are a couple of annoyances however that I hope get addressed in a future update that will help make the game much better. For starters, the Letterpress seriously needs a rematch button. The fact that I have to go into Game Center each time to start a new game against someone I’ve already played against is very annoying and time consuming. There also needs to be a way to view words already used while still in a match instead of after the match is over. I’d also love to see the inclusion of stats so I can see how many times I’ve won or lost against certain players. If they can make these improvements and additions, it will make this already fun game even better.

Letterpress is available now in the App Store for free. It is a universal app and is compatible with iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, iPhone 5, iPod touch (3rd generation), iPod touch (4th generation), iPod touch (5th generation) and iPad. Requires iOS 5.0 or later. This app is optimized for iPhone 5.

Description

Find words, steal tiles, color the board! Letterpress is a fresh new word game for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch. Play against your friends using Game Center! The perfect blend of fun and strategy.

[via App Store]