From the Far East, vendors have brought 26 new ingredients for the alchemists to use in their potions. Now is the time to prove that you’re the most capable alchemist in town.
2-4 players, ages 14+
Playing time: 25-40 minutes
Designer: Christian Giove
Artwork: Kuo Yang
Publisher: Artipia Games
https://www.artipiagames.com/
During a game of WordCraft, players take on the role of alchemists trying to use the new ingrediënts to create recipes. The game is played over three rounds in which players will try to make words with the letters depicted on cards in the center of the table. Every round new combinations will be available in each of the five categories of letters. Players put their markers on the corner of the letters they use, possibly using a letter multiple times.
Points are awarded at the end of the rounds for the majority per letter, giving more points for less frequently used letters like X, Z and Qu and fewer points for more common letters like R, N and vowels. At the end of the game, players also get points for their markers on each of the 4 goal cards, for example: words with specific amount of letters, words starting with one color and ending with another or a fixed combination of colors. The player with the most points wins and is declared the most capable alchemist around the table.
WordCraft is an easy-to-learn family game that’s a fun combination of a word game mixed with the area majority mechanism. The rules and ways of scoring are simple enough to make this game accessible to everyone.
While playing we discovered that not always the long and difficult words are the key to success, building shorter words with less common letters can earn the player many points by getting the majority for these letters.
A big plus is that in WordCraft, you can choose in which language you play. The game itself is language independent and the rules suggest that before playing you agree according to which dictionary you are going to play. So it’s not only fun to play but always can be used to learn or practice a different language.
Tabletopping 