Fruit Machine Chat

Saw this for the first time this evening in Southwark and managed to have half a go before my good friend turned up for drinks and chat.

It involves a large (maybe 14x14) 3D cube made of approx 14x14x14 smaller cubes, each with a different letter on every side. The aim is to make words with the letters apparent on visible cube faces. Cubes disappear once used in a word in a WU/WW styley. Clearing is a possibility, tho' judging by the sheer quantity of small cubes, it may have to be a rush job to say the least. It's also a rather fiddly affair and discriminates against those with fat, unwieldy fingers, like Fotherz.

Will seek it out tomorrow in Colchester and put in a proper session to fathom which dictionary it uses etc

So do the individual cubes rotate, or does the overall cube rotate?
PS I voted for the second option, even though I don't know what it means.

Ernest W. Quality wrote:So do the individual cubes rotate, or does the overall cube rotate?

Rotate? Rotate? Who said anything about rotating? I can most assuredly assure you that none of the cubes rotate! Cubes may disappear on being used - that they may do. But rotate - most certainly not!

PS Wherever did you get this rotation idea from?

Oh dear. Sounds like a Word Up ( And I think people know my opinion on that ) rip off to me, but poorly done.

vaginalbob wrote:Rotate? Rotate? Who said anything about rotating? I can most assuredly assure you that none of the cubes rotate! Cubes may disappear on being used - that they may do. But rotate - most certainly not!
PS Wherever did you get this rotation idea from?

Weeeeell... it's a cube, not a square, so I know I certainly assumed it'd rotate! If not, how do you access the different sides of the large and small cubes?

Weyland wrote:If not, how do you access the different sides of the large and small cubes?

You can't access every side, only the ones that are visible.

ops: Do you think it's as good or a contender. Normally these things don't, but....

surprised that the Bobs didn't clock this at ATEI. it is an unambitious rip off of WU (so doesn't use the same wordlist) and to my mind it is overcomplicated. and i agree about the fat fingers thing.

mind you i haven't seen it on the streets so maybe they have tweaked the release version.

i will certainly give it a go when i see it but unless it has spelvinesque generosity i'll stick to WU thank you very much. WC is an inferior (but embellished) copy of an established success.

c.f. happy shopper joka kola

Well thats all grown up of you all to ignore me, isn't it! I'm taking my ball home...

WG
going on trends i wouldn't have said it is a contender but what to i know?
i haven't even played the final version yet so my comments are probably null and void at the moment.

Well, I went into town for a two hour sesh on Word Cube this afternoon and I have to say that this game is absolute QUALITY.

Why?

- seems to use the SOWPODS dictionary (it took 3 letter words like JUN, JUS, MUX...), making for more possibilities than Word Up.

- relentless pace - it seems like the cubes are hypothetically clearable in their entirety, but there isn't enough time to do so (the furthest I got was removing maybe two thirds of them). This means that you have to be inputting words constantly, as in Word Wall. Time can be added by using high-score letters such as J,X,Qu,Z.

- the 3D element - WU looks a bit simple after it. 'Tis a total mindfxxk.

- tactical elements - although not all tiles are visible from the start, as in WU, there are strategic considerations - the game's gravity is consistent, allowing you to set up nice words. There is also strategy in the use of the 'shuffle' (which can be used as much as you want to, as in WW).

- scoring - the game scores words by adding tile values and then multiplying the total by word length, as in WU. However, there are bonuses available for the use of letters adjoining others on the same cube - an added dimension (HARGH HARGH HARGH).

- prize behaviour - the game doesn't seek to shaft you if you start winning cash, it pushes the money up gradually to match your skill (or at least it did for this sesh).

- the 'help' feature is actually useful, giving 7/8 letter words.

Negatives:

- the game is quite fiddly, especially in selecting letters on the upper faces of cubes, but after a while I got the hang of it.

- Scrabble players have a big advantage over ppl without SOWPODS knowledge - not so much of a level playing field as WU.

Scores: I didn't see any scores above 1000pts by others (it had been played), thus the national scoreboard currently stands so:

VAJINAL BOB (ARG): 2858, 2526, 2417, 2395, 2320, 2230, 2186, 2064, 2061 All at the Hole in the Wall, Colchester

As much as I hate to talk about Word Up.... Here goes..

quoting from another thread...

WU prize cycle (£10 at 1150 points, then £1 at 1850) wrote: http://fruitchat.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t= ... highlight=

cardinal richelieu wrote:Regarding the payouts...

Around my way, ...

Since then, whenever I've played it, the points have never been lower than 1850. It does get played a few times, but the high scores are still my paltry 1000-1200 efforts, so it's obviously not getting "done".

....

Around my way (West Midlands), the lowest high score on Word Up that I have seen was 1600 - 1800. Thus I reckon that all are "done", and as I don't play to get my name on the high score, so am I with this game.

I have seen a group doing Word Cube, and they managed 2300+. They did not have many cubes left, and were only going for short words (at quite an impressive rate I must say ), so I would say that it must be possible to clear by the likes of VB et al. No idea of what you get if you clear it.

As I still hate Word Up, and this looks like more of the same, I think that I will give it a miss, if you don't mind.

BigEd wrote: Around my way (West Midlands), the lowest high score on Word Up that I have seen was 1600 - 1800.

Where in the Midlands, exactly? The team must go fight the insurgents. Any 1900+ scores around your way?

If you send in any 1800+ scores you see, I'm sure Ernest will give you a ginger biscuit or two in return

BigEd wrote: So I would say that it must be possible to clear by the likes of VB et al.

Hmm will give it a go tomorrow, in a short word styley. Tho' I did manage 68 words on one of my goes today.

As a measure of the frenetic nature of the WC game, the points scoring is similar to WU (80-120pts for 7/8 letter words) as well as the total game time, so 2800pts is like doing a 2800 non-clear on WU (which shows the 'limitations' imposed by WU's smaller spread of tiles/boxes and weightier tactical demands).

Hmm. Haven't seen it yet, but seems to me that the more tiles they give you, it is even more in your favour to simply hack as fast as possible without thinking of word quality. Art is born of constraint and dies of freedom.

Are there score boards for individual words?

Ernest W. Quality wrote:Hmm. Haven't seen it yet, but seems to me that the more tiles they give you, it is even more in your favour to simply hack as fast as possible without thinking of word quality. Art is born of constraint and dies of freedom.

I'm pretty sure the top scores on this will be achieved by using mainly 5+ letter words - the pts multiplication thing comes into play, as on WU and SU. I improved by about 1000pts yesterday by forcing myself to choose words of at least 4/5 letters (apart from grabbing power letters at every opportunity to add time on).

Ernest W. Quality wrote:Are there score boards for individual words?

Yes - but I dare say that on most machines they will be dominated by words chosen by the help feature! I think you would have to stipulate 9+ letter entries for a national board.