NYT Crossplay: Word Games

The interface, gameplay, clean graphics, the ability to save my progress to Apple ID with my NYT account, the whole core mechanics of this game is incredible. It is so addicting placing words and adding friends and seeing everyone’s statistics in each profile and watching my own stats in my profile rack up! Very smooth and crisp! The ads also isn’t an issue with NYT games ads only them only being 5 seconds feels endless and seamless between some games, they also don’t pop up after every turn that some other word games have as an issue. This is a simple clean cut word game where there isn’t any currency or other type of power up’s to help with words/ having the game find them/place them for you, this is purely and entirely your own mind and tiles! Also this game makes it unique where it feels fresh and different from say scrabble or words with friends making this game even better! Please keep this going forever with updates! The best game on the Apple Store that I have played in a long time! A must have for word games on your phone. Again, Better than other leading ones in the same category!

This game is a lot like Scrabble, a game I love and have played since childhood. Unfortunately, there are some key differences that make it less than stellar. One thing is that when you play against another human being, the game can really drag on. As long as a player takes their turn within 7 days, the game is viable. I just finished a game that went on for 11 days. I don’t expect people to e waiting to make a move at any moments, but 11 days is like, why bother? The worst part, though is there are all sorts of “words” that I would never accept from an opponent on Scrabble. I just finished reviewing a game I played and the bot told me my best move would have been “mm”. Since when is “mm” a word?! I’ve taken to just trying random letter combinations until something sticks. Like, I could play this game with no knowledge of English and probably do fine.

This is basically a copy of Words With Friends but with a few tweaks, including a slightly different board layout and slightly different tile scoring. Unfortunately, none of these tweaks improve the game over other on-line iterations of the concept. Bothersome is that the game promises to pair you with a player equal to your playing level, but this is not the case. You can see others’ stats, and I’m often paired with someone who’s playing level is not close to mine. Most bothersome is the option to play against the computer, as even the hardest level is far too easy. My scores against the computer are consistently in the range of +200 points and double the computer’s score. Why not have a very hard level? It’s difficult to fathom why NYT Games wouldn’t create a more innovative and challenging product. But it is typical of the “dumbing down” of NYT games recently, especially the crossword. Clearly this new addition to NYT Games is a money grab. It’s sad the NYT no longer sees an investment in quality over mediocrity as a factor in the success of the NYT brand.