Where great things start…
When a game starts the tile stack is shuffled (the number of tiles in the stack depends on the length of the game you chose on the start screen), and then you, and your opponent (online via Game Center, or AI) are allocated an initial set of tiles.
At the top of the screen, the you can see the current state of the game:
On the left you will see how many tiles your opponent has been so far unable to add to their word grid. On the right, you will see the number of tiles remaining in the stack.
The colour of both the opponent state, and the game state will change from green, to amber, to red as the number of tiles approaches zero.
When the stack is empty, the first player to allocate all of their tiles to their word grid (when it is bright green), is the winner.
When you need to add a tile, you tap on the “+” button up in the top-left corner. The trick is, when you do that, you have to wait for a little while before you can use that button again. This is to help prevent you (or your opponent) from just spamming the “+” button and claiming all the tiles. Be aware also that when you request a tile, your opponent also gets a new tile. That’s why you sometimes get a tile added automatically; because your opponent has requested a new tile.
To discard a tile, long press the tile and it will start wiggling. If you long press it again, it will be discarded, and added back into the stack of tiles. When you discard a tile, you get 3 in return.
Your word grid needs to be bright green for you to win. For example:
Shows a word grid where there are tiles that don’t make up a valid word. Moving the “Y” into position fixes that, and the grid changes to a green, “valid” state.
To win the game you need to be the first player with all of your tiles connected in a single green word grid.
You can use a normal pinch gesture to zoom in and out. Sometimes tiles seem a bit small for me, so I added this in to make it easier, especially on smaller phones. It’s worth noting that on the settings scfeen you can enable/disable a setting to let the app auto-zoom to keep your tiles on screen. You can also rotate your device and play in landscape or portrait mode if that helps.
You can use two-fingers to pan, or move your board around, just in case there is a lone tile not on the screen.
You can watch your opponent play by tapping on the button on the top-right of the screen. Tapping on that button again will return you to your own board.
It’s worth being aware that the word list I have built into the game, is roughly the equivalent of the scrabble dictionary of 2 to 9 letter words. Words longer than that won’t be recognised. Likewise, 1 letter words are also not included.