Wordish on iPad: Simple, Fast, Addictive Word Game

Wordish is a new word game for the iPhone that is very simple and lots of fun. Even though this is an iPhone app the nature of the game and the very bare bones interface mean that it works great on the iPad too.

I’m a big fan of word games on the iPad. My long-time favorite is Word Ladder but I always have a number of different ones installed to play on my own, with my daughter, or against friends and random online opponents. Wordish is very much at the most basic end of the spectrum when it comes to word games, and you certainly won’t find any strategic elements to the game as you do in Letterpress for example.

Instead this is a very quick no frills sort of word making challenge.

Here’s how it works:

You tap Start and you get a set of 8 randomly selected letters. A timer starts and you have 90 seconds to make as many words as you can. Longer words earn more points and you lose points if you enter a ‘gibberish’ word.

And that’s all there is to it – again, very quick and easy to play. When you finish a game you can send a challenge to a friend via email or to anyone out there via Twitter and Facebook:

… or post a challenge on Twitter or Facebook – for others to pick up. Your opponent is given the same set of characters to play with. The result is sent back to you.

On Facebook, results are posted as comments to your “Challenge-post” making it possible to compare everyones scores.

The game also asks if you want to auto-post your scores to Facebook. I opt out of that so as not to spam my friends and also to save embarrassment when my scores are not so great.

It uses the built-in dictionary to determine whether words are valid and can be played in the following languages:

– English
– French
– German
– Spanish
– Portuguese
– Italian
– Swedish
– Danish
– Norwegian

Honestly when I first saw this game I didn’t think it sounded very exciting, but from the moment I installed it I’ve found it seriously addictive. It’s a lot like a favorite savory snack you can never have just one of. I find myself continually saying ‘just one more try’ – sometimes to make up for a bad score, sometimes to try to beat a particularly good score, but I’m always wanting to have another crack at it.

I also enjoy Wordish because it’s the ultimate gap-filler sort of game on the iPad. Because it’s so fast and easy to play, it’s a great time killer during a commercial break while watching TV or when ou’re waiting for a meal to finish cooking or just about any time you’ve got a free minute or two.

I’d love to see it made a universal app with an iPad version – and Game Center support would be nice too.

Here’s an App Store link for Wordish; it’s priced at $0,99.

Disclosure: This app was independently purchased by the post author – for information about our review policies please see the About page.