LOGOMAKI is a new game which has been developed by Castle Oaks. The above is a screen shot of the game. It is provided in both a Windows version and a DOS version. You may be curious about the name of this game. Look up the word, LOGOMACHY, in your dictionary and the reason for the name will be obvious. If you want to get a feel for playing the game, Castle Oaks has developed LOGOMAKI Junior, which is freeware. It has all of the functionality of the full commercial version except you are limited to 2, 3, and 4 letter words. You may download the DOS version here: LOGOMAKI Jr. Castle Oaks also has a Windows version of LOGOMAKI Junior; it also is free, you can download it here: WINDOWS LOGOMAKI Jr. Due to its size (290K), you may not want to download it, but it is available by mail. It may be obtained by sending a shipping and handling fee of $5.00 to the above address.
The game has features similar to word games such as SCRABBLE (SCRABBLE is a registered trade mark of Milton Bradley) and other word games. LOGOMAKI is played on an IBM compatible personal computer. It is played using the PC's mouse. When you start the game, you can choose any number of players from 1 through 4. You are then asked for the names of each player. When all names have been entered a screen similar to the one above will be shown. The first player's name will be displayed in red (a red, blinking asterisk is used in the DOS version.) Twenty-five letters will be displayed in a square array of tiles. A player constructs a word by clicking the left mouse button on each letter (in order) needed to construct the word. If you accidently click on a letter that you didn't mean to select, you cannot correct it (but you can discard it.) You must try to go ahead and use that letter in a different word, if possible. This condition is part of the challenge of the game. You must be careful! As each letter is selected, the letter disappears from the tile and appears in the box at the top of the screen.
The color of the letters in the tiles indicate their point value. A black letter is worth 1 point; a blue letter is worth 5 points; and a red letter is worth 10 points. Letters appear in the array of tiles in the same statistical frequency as they appear in English usage. In addition to the total of the letter values in a word, you can earn a bonus for long words. Words must be at least 4 letters in length (4 is the default, but it can be changed at the start of a game.) A 4 letter word receives no bonus; the 5th letter gets 1 point; the 6th letter gets 2 points; the 7th letter gets 3 points; the 8th letter gets 4 points; the 9th letter gets 5 points; etc. To get your total bonus points, you add up the bonus points for each letter after the first 4 letters. Thus, a 9 letter word gets a bonus of 15 points. You can construct words up to 20 letters. After constructing a word, you must test it by clicking on the TEST button. If the word is found in the LOGOMAKI vocabulary, the word score plus bonus is added to the player's total score. The player can continue to construct words using the remaining letters in the array. A player's turn terminates if a word fails the vocabulary test, or if the player voluntarily terminates his turn by clicking on the QUIT TURN button (if you know you can't make a word, you might as well quit.) When a player's turn ends, the array of buttons go blank, and the next player's name is indicated. The next player then clicks on the NEXT button, and the array is filled with a new set of letters. Play continues until a player's score exceeds the winning score (200 is the default winning score, but it can be changed.) Each player gets the same number of turns. If two or more player's scores exceed the winning score on the final turn, the one with the highest score wins.
Illustrated below is a sample array of letters.
This array is provided to give you a chance at trying your hand at playing this game. Construct words as described above and score according to the rules given. Remember that once you have used a letter, it cannot be used again. If you use all of the letters (there is another bonus for using all 25 letters,) the letter score will total 82. The difference between getting a good score and a great score is in how many bonus points you can score. The best score made on the given letters to date is 118. If you think you have earned a better score on this sample, you can send me the words you have made and the total score, by e-mail to: scores.
To see a demonstration of some actual play (DOS version), click on demo.
After seeing the demonstration or trying out the Junior version, you may want to purchase the full commercial package which includes both the DOS and WINDOWS versions. LOGOMAKI can be purchased by sending a check or money order for $19.95 to:
CASTLE OAKS COMPUTER SERVICES
10632 E. 79th Street
Indianapolis, IN 46236
Postage is paid for orders in North America others please include an additional $2.00 for overseas postage. Indiana residents include sales tax.