A cheat app for new Gold Award-winning word game
Letterpress has just landed on Apple's App Store for the iPhone and iPad.
This 69p / 99c application, simply entitled
Cheaterpress [
download], can analyse a screenshot of your current
Letterpress game board and display a list of every possible letter combination.
The list will even give you a point value for each word.
In
Cheaterpress's App Store description, its dev warns that this app will only work with
Letterpress's default 'Light' theme. You can change your theme through the game's 'More' menu.
Need to cheat?According to American game designer Raph Koster, by the way,
Letterpress is a "solved game".
Basically, Koster believes you can win almost every game by following these four simple rules:
1. Play for territory rather than big words. The former is more important.
2. Expand outward from a single point.
3. Ensure that you take vowels and extenders as soon as you possibly can.
4. Take out the last remaining grey tiles whenever you're winning.
You may not even need the abovementioned cheat app, then.
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mr_bez | 13:02 - 8 November 2012
Letterpress doesn't keep stats but I reckon I've played 100+ games. Koster's right that it's possible to win almost any game if you're good enough and follow a strategy, but that's true of almost any word game and doesn't mean it's a solved game. His strategy is pretty obvious and I think most of the people I've played try to follow those rules, yet I have still never lost a game.
The key is knowing where to strike the balance between territory and big words, and deciding which grey tiles to take and when. "Whenever you're winning" doesn't mean whenever you've got more tiles than your opponent.
Also, always try to extend your word as much as possible (add -s, -ion, -er, -ize, and so on) to block your opponent, and think about what clues you are giving away with your word. If you play chemistries and chemistry is also available, you might want to hold that word in reserve.
I wouldn't bother with the cheat app. I'm pretty sure I've already played someone using an anagram solver who was coming up with obscure 15 letter words every time, but I still won by virtue of better strategy.
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