Word Slots - By OatyCakes Software - 99¢

[OatyCakes]

[QuickWit]

I've been playing around a little with this game and there are some good and bad things with it.

Basically you spin the slots and see where the letters line up. Then you "boggle" your way to spell words. You've got a certain number of words, and a minimum length for them, that have to be completed to win that spin.

The play as it stands is fine and there can be some tense moments as you're trying to find enough words. You can reuse letters which is nice. And you'll also find some "semi" wild spots on the board to help as well. I say "semi" because you can't choose any letter, you're given a group to choose from and one you've picked the letter it stays on the board.

I like the play of the game and the changing board. It's something a little different in the word game category. The game keeps stats on all of your words and even has some achievements to go after.

But there seems to be a few places where they miss the mark, sometimes badly. The achievements I mentioned come three at a time. We're used to that by now, but you can only achieve them when they come up and they're pretty simple. You don't collect them until you "cash out" so you have to keep in your mind what you are trying to get and then cash out so you can get a new one. It won't tell you when you've achieved it. Not a huge deal, just a little irritating.

Oh, and one achievement says "Cash out with exactly $18.00 profit". I don't even see how that is possible with the betting system.

And the betting is really odd. On the wheel I'm playing you bet $100 and I guess if you get it done you win $150. This means you get $50, but I don't understand the "whys" to it. it should be set that if you get longer words you get more money. There should be a big pay out if you get a word that actually goes all the way from one side of the slots to the other. It's cheap that I can make 5 three letter words and I get the same as if I had done 5 five letter words. There's no reason to try at that point.

That's the part where they really missed out on the theme. There's no "slot" fun with this game. It just a replacement of the "boggle shake" with a wheel spin. Easily the saddest miss I've seen in a game in a while. This could have been really cool.

Also, the music is beyond horrible. I'll admit that I usually play games with the music off, but I haven't been so happy to turn it off as I was with this game. It gets even worse when you win a round and different music plays over the already horrible stuff you were hearing.

This style of game has some real potential and I hope the devs take a look at what it could have been and tweak it. If you're going to have a "slots" experience, you have to give the player enough of it to make it work.

For some reason I keep playing through the levels, but I'm sure that the boredom will hit and the game will be gone, unless they come up with a way to keep me coming back to it.

[OatyCakes]

Thanks for the feedback! I really appreciate your honesty about what you like and don't also, the depth of your impressions, it really helps. This is our first game and we were trying to do a lot of stuff with it. I can tell you, we definitely have updates planned. It sounds like some new music should be in our first update

[QuickWit]

As I mentioned... there are some things that are really likable with this game and I think just a few things to help give it the "Slot" experience would be good.

For instance... you should bet your coins (making it a decision on your part how much you want to go for) and then spin. Then you've got something like 30 seconds to do as many words as you can to earn money. If you can make enough words you'll win back your money and more... if not, you don't

Longer words are worth more and there should be a bonus for getting a word to travel from one side to the other.

There will be times when you can not find enough words to get your money back and that's perfectly fine. This is the way it is in a casino and why they get rich.

But you could earn bonus objects along the way that would give you a wild card or something like that to help you along the way.

This would really help out the game. If you wanted to get crazy you could give us a more bland character and then we could buy accessories to go with the character... probably a bit much for now.

As for the music... It was the song for the "Peacock" machine. Really loud and annoying, especially when the winning music and the cash out music came in over the top... It might work if you just stop the one song and not have them play together. I noticed the music seems to come from a Studio Pro or Garageband set so I'm sure you can find some better selections. The Fish Machine is fine.

[OatyCakes]

Thanks again, I'll have to have you beta test my next game. I'm glad you like the casino direction. It sounds to me like an "arcade" mode might be just the ticket. Less mellow, more directed by the game than the user. That sounds an awful lot like F2P though! Word Slots Blitz!