Margot's Word Brain

Margot's Word Brain
Ages: Everyone +10

Any game title that uses "Brain" is counting on those people who feel that their brain needs exercise to put down money for it. I feel about brain exercise like I do about eye exercise. Aside from sitting in a dark room with a blindfold - it hard not exercise your eyes and brain. I am not objecting to the game - I am objecting to the word "Brain" in the title - this is basically a word game. It will be too simple for those adept and making money from Scrabble, or for addicts to the Sunday Times crossword puzzles, but just right for those on a three to five letter word level.

There are six different styles of word puzzles:

Word Run - make your own Scrabble game

Word Link - make as many 3, 4 and 5 letter words from a grid of letters as you can

Word Mine - how many words can you make from a bunch of letters

Word Safe - make words from two wheels of letters. This is more interesting because the circular arrangement makes it harder to spot words

Word Search - Margot flashed 3 six-letter words; then you have to find them within a word grid - only hard to do with your eyes closed.

Hyper Txt - the most challenging, has you use a phone pad to make words. If you know how difficult it is to spell out names in your phone directory you will know what I mean. Kids who do text-messaging already have their brains wired to this format.

The tick-tocking of the clock as time winds down is meant to heighten excitement - it does not - and is the first thing I silenced. The games are all timed and the goal is to get the highest score. At each play you are expected to re-enter your name. This totally makes it impossible to just play the games for fun. And, Margo intrudes by popping up and down instead of just staying on the screen. Her voice is pleasant enough on both platforms but she seems to develop a lisp on the DS.

The game came out on the Wii and on the DS. The use of the Wii remote to make selections is unfortunate. The game is timed, and this coupled with the insensitivity of the remote makes the game grandly frustrating. The game is infinitely more satisfying on the DS. Zoo Games need to put together a team that has more experience in game making.

Fun Factor: Barely
Female Factor: Who is this Margot person?
Player Friendly: Could be better.

Reviewed by: Editor - 11/08

Margot's Word Brain

Platform(s): Wii GBDS

To Order: Win http://www.amazon.com/ $14.99

To Order: GBDS http://www.amazon.com/ $19.99