Game Review: Nerdy Wordy

Briarpatch, $17.99

Nerdy Wordy is a new word game from Briarpatch. At first I thought I had never heard of Briarpatch, but after looking at their web site, I realized I’m familiar with their games – just not the company. They also produce the “I Spy” games, “Thomas and Friends” games, and others you would probably recognize.

As a fan of word games, I was excited to give this one a try. It’s also a two-player game, and we’ve come to realize there are times that you can only find one person to play, so two player games are also of interest.

The game has two flip-top game boards (like the old “Battleship” game, each equipped with 25 letter cubes - five containing the letters A through F, five with G to L, five with M to R, five with S to X, three with Y and Z, and two blanks (wild cards).

The game boards contain five rows of five wells in which to place the cubes. You take turns choosing a letter from your remaining cubes, and both players secretly place the cubes into their board. The goal is to form as many words as possible - crossword style. When the all letters have been used and the boards are full, the winner is the one with the most points.

You get points for complete words but also for words within words. For examples, “STEAM” contains “TEAM”, “TEA”, and “AM” - all of them score.

Although the game seems like it should be fun, my oldest daughter and I didn’t really like it. For one thing, with the premium placed on words that contain other words, it seemed like the winner was always going to be the one using the big point words. For example, “STONE” contains “TONE”, “TON”, “ONE”, and “ON” - at five points per letter, that’s 85 points. Also, the game boards seemed small - especially compared to the size of the box - and were quite hard to open.

All in all, though, it’s challenging, quick, and easy to play. My guess is that it would be more fun for younger word game players, as they are more likely to keep trying different strategies and words rather than quickly realizing the need to use the “big money” words.