Spry Fox, developers of hit puzzle game Triple Town (Free), have soft launched a new word game in New Zealand, called Alphabear. The goal of the game is to form words on a grid of different sizes, with different levels requiring different grids. Letters pop up with timers as to how many turns they have left before they turn into stone. This is bad because playing a tile forms a bear, with adjacent bears combining into bigger bears. And while Stephen Colbert might not approve, you want the biggest bear possible, ideally one big bear that fills up the entire grid. And if there are any stones, that affects your ability to make big ol’ bears.
You collect a variety of bears as you play, that modify the scoring and game in different ways, and can be used on recharging timer systems, which can be skipped through using coins. Completing the different levels can earn you better quality bears, from the 67 currently available. It’s kind of an interesting game, and the monetization method is interesting, with an energy system that you can buy out of, and coins that are earned and spent on timer skips. I wonder how people will take to it, but it’s got a stylish look, and solid word game mechanics. We’ll see just how this adjusts and changes if and when it goes worldwide. And while we’re at it, how about bringing Road Not Taken to iOS as well? Not that I don’t have it in a massive unplayed Steam backlog or anything, no. If you want to chat about Alphabear in its soft launch, check out the forum thread.
