(The game may take a few seconds to load. Requires Java.)
|
Check any word's meaning in one of these online dictionaries: |
In a previous item, it was reported that Letterbox player Kathy, from California, had achieved a Letterbox score of 29. We didn't reveal her winning game at the time, just the letters. Well, now here it is:
| G | L | O | W | 4 |
| N | A | M | E | 3 |
| A | M | E | N | 4 |
| H | A | N | D | 4 |
| 1 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 29 |
Readers were challenged to see how big a score they could manage using those letters. Bearing in mind that Kathy was seeing the letters one at a time when she scored 29, it would seem feasible that others could equal or better this score when the letters are all known at the beginning.
But nobody did. Actually nobody sent in an entry, so we don't know how many people tried. (Well, we tried, but didn't do any good.) But we did set the Letterbox software to work, playing thousands of games by itself, with just those 16 letters. After 100,000 games, the computer managed to come up with a maximum score of... 29. And it got this score with exactly the same arrangement as Kathy had. In fact, it got this arrangement, and the same arrangement with rows and columns swapped, a few times, but no other arrangement scoring better than 26.
So it looks like the arrangement Kathy used might be the best possible with those letters. But as for the best possible score with any letters, we don't know - so keep playing Letterbox and see what you can come up with!
Kathy, from California, reports that she has achieved a Letterbox score of 29. Since Letterbox doesn't have a high score table, there is no way of knowing if this is the highest score ever, but it could well be, since the best score I had ever seen previously was 26. (See this story for an example.)
Rather than giving Kathy's words right away, here are the letters she got, in alphabetical order:
A A A D E E G H L M M N N N O W
Let's see if anyone can come up with an arrangement of these letters that scores 29 (or better!), using the usual Letterbox scoring: 1 point for a 3-letter word and 3 points for a 4-letter word. It's not that easy, even knowing all the letters in advance, which of course Kathy didn't. (The computer scored 23, with its skill boost option turned on.) If you can't reach 29, you can still send in your best efforts. Use the Contact form or send an email.
In a couple of weeks, Kathy's arrangement will be posted here, along with any other good efforts submitted. The prize for the best entry - honour and glory.
To help you know which words are allowed, here is the Letterbox word list. A couple of the words Kathy used are not in everyday use, but they are all in the top half of the Wordcount Archive.
If you enjoy this challenge, you will probably like Euler's Day Off. This site has a new puzzle every day, where you have to arrange 25 letters in a 5 by 5 grid to make words across and down. The scoring is not the same as in Letterbox, but it calls for some of the same kind of reasoning.
Ozlip, the word game for Aussies, is now available on Telstra mobile phones.
Ozlip is a version of the Letterbox game featuring an Australian vocabulary.
You can also play Ozlip online at its website, Ozlip - the word game for Aussies.
Give it a burl. You'll be rapt!
This was the question recently asked by a Letterbox player.
The short answer is, nobody knows! There is no high score table, although one may be introduced in the future. (The mobile phone version of the game, Lexi, does keep high scores, but they are stored on each player's phone - there is no global high score table.)
I once scored 25, but unfortunately I didn't make a note of the letters. (I probably should mention that I have played many thousands of games with lower scores.) Here is one that the computer got once, with a score of 26:
| D | I | N | T | 4 |
| S | L | O | T | 4 |
| H | E | R | E | 5 |
| T | A | M | P | 5 |
| 0 | 4 | 4 | 0 | 26 |
I don't think I have ever seen the computer get more than 26.
What's your best score (so far)?
Back to the gameOzlip, the Australian-vocabulary word game, can now be played on the Web, at its website, Ozlip - the word game for Aussies.
It's based on Letterbox, but uses an Australian-oriented word list and gives bonus points for every Australian word you can make.
The Ozlip game also has a lot of other new features, including a local high score table, stored in "cookies" on your computer. These features are soon going to be added to the Letterbox game, so go and have a look at them, even if you're not especially interested in the way we Aussies speak.
Back to the gameThe Letterbox Word Game now recognizes these additional three- and four-letter words:
Some of the new words were submitted on the Letterbox Word Suggestion Form. Thanks for your ideas, and please keep the suggestions coming in.
Remember, words spelt with a capital letter are not allowed in the game, in line with common word game practice. For this reason, the suggestion June has not been included. There is a US dialect word june meaning to move around in a lively fashion (I regard this as being too obscure), but I assume the person making the suggestion was thinking of the month, since the word was typed with a capital J.
For similar reasons, jew and hun have not been added to the word list. It's true that some dictionaries do give the lower case spellings of these words, when used as offensive and derogatory terms, but these spellings seem to be rather dated. (The fact that a word is offensive does not rule it out, as words such as dago are already accepted in the game. It should go without saying that recognizing a word in a word game does not imply endorsement of the use of that word in speech or writing. Prejudice of any kind is ill-informed and obnoxious, and is not condoned by the Letterbox website.)
Some words using the letter Q without a U have been suggested. Of these, I have accepted qat, an Arabian shrub whose leaves are chewed or infused as a stimulant, but I think qaid is far too obscure and I don't think I should include qoph, a letter of the Hebrew alphabet, since no other letters of that alphabet are allowed.
Speaking of Q words, quad and quod have both been suggested, but both are already part of the Letterbox word list! Finally, I have not added que. Sometimes English speakers will ask, "Que?", in Fawlty Towers style, but it remains a Spanish word. (Que is also an old English word for half a farthing, but this is surely too obscure.)
For all you Australian word-game lovers (or those who are not Aussies, but would like to test their knowledge of Australian English), I am working on a Letterbox-style game that uses an Australian vocabulary.
It's called Ozlip, and you can read about it on its own website: Ozlip - the word game for Aussies.
Back to the gameThe Puzzle Monster website has posted a review of the Letterbox Game. The review is very favourable, calling the game "entertaining, challenging, and addictive". Thanks, Puzzle Monster!
However, the review does raise - in a joking way - the question of how honest the game software is. The computer, they say, "has a suspicious knack of anticipating what letters are coming". I can assure all Letterbox players, on my honour as a game programmer, that the computer has no advance knowledge of the letters. It calculates its moves based on probabilities.
The computer has a number of advantages over you and me:
Because the computer's play is based on probabilities, it often does badly when there is an unlikely collection of letters in the later part of the game. A human player might risk a move that gives a slight chance of doing very well if the right letters come up, and this will sometimes pay off.
The most important advantage that human players have is that we can learn from experience and improve our play over time. The Letterbox game software, at a given skill level setting, does not improve over time. (But watch out for future releases of Letterbox!)
The Puzzle Monster review also suggests a couple of improvements to the game - a finishing point to the competition after reaching, say, 500 points, and a winners' list. These are along the same lines as suggestions others have made, and I definitely hope to implement some such features. Watch this space.
Back to the gameThe Letterbox Game site now has a Links page. Here you will find a select listing of books and websites that may appeal to the lover of word games and wordplay.
The Letterbox Word Game now recognizes these additional three- and four-letter words:
Some of the new words were submitted on the Letterbox Word Suggestion Form. Thanks for your ideas, and please keep the suggestions coming in.
In coming up with these new words, I have used a number of dictionaries, and also the "12dicts" lists compiled by Alan Beale, and generously made available on the Web at wordlist.sourceforge.net. Reviewing the Letterbox word list is a continuing process. Stay tuned for further improvements. As always, your comments are invited.
To the Letterbox player who suggested snee, I'm sorry but I can't persuade myself to include it. If a word is suggested by a player, I like to give it the benefit of the doubt, but this one seems too obscure. (For the benefit of those who - like me until a few weeks ago - have not heard of this word, it means "cut" and is found in the phrases snick and snee and snick or snee, meaning to fight with knives. A related term for knife-fighting, or a sword-like knife, is the splendidly onomatopoeic snickersnee, presumably the inspiration for Lewis Carroll's "The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!". These terms are in the Shorter Oxford Dictionary, but it has no entry for snee by itself. The only online dictionary I could find it in is the Universal Word Games Dictionary. [Later note: This dictionary seems now to have disappeared off the Web.] There is also a discussion of snee and snickersnee on the Random House website in The Maven's Word of the Day for 6 March 2001.)
The Letterbox Word Game has been upgraded again. It now recognizes these additional three- and four-letter words:
Some of the new words were submitted on the Letterbox Word Suggestion Form. Thanks for your ideas, and please keep the suggestions rolling in: the word list will be updated as often as necessary to incorporate good suggestions.
To the anonymous Letterbox player who suggested "seti", the only usage I could find was in capitals, SETI (the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence). Letterbox, like most word-building games, does not allow abbreviations normally written in capitals. Sorry! (The current word list rules are on the Word Suggestion Form.)
The Letterbox Word Game has been upgraded to recognize 107 additional three- and four-letter words.
Some of the new words were submitted on the Letterbox Word Suggestion Form. Thanks for your ideas, and please keep the suggestions rolling in: the word list will be updated as often as necessary to incorporate good suggestions.
The new word list includes virtually all of the suggestions made by players of the Letterbox Word Game and its mobile phone counterpart, Lexi Word Game. Not quite all the suggestions - I couldn't bring myself to accept "sux". What do you think?
Six "words", that probably never should have been in the list, have been removed, and are no longer accepted by the Letterbox Game. They are ANDS, BAS, NOM, ORS, PAS and REX.
Deciding what words should be allowed in a word game like Letterbox is a delicate balancing act. Leave too many words out of the game's vocabulary and players will be frustrated that they can't score for some genuine words. Include too many words and players will be frustrated because the computer will be scoring for words the players have never heard of.
My rule of thumb is to leave out a word that is very obscure, even if it is in most good English dictionaries. But how to decide what is "very obscure"? You can probably guess the answer - if I haven't heard of a word, I pronounce it to be too obscure for Letterbox. But everyone will have their own ideas about what is obscure and what is not, so please let me know your thoughts.
And what are the 107 new words recognized by the Letterbox Game? Here they are.
 |
Recommended directory of online games -
|
Site last updated 30 January 2008.
Letterbox Game website and software © Alan Walker 2002-2008. |