New Way to Play - Handheld Crossword Game
Written: Oct 08 '03 (Updated Oct 29 '03)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Great for crossword puzzle fanatics. Fun and very compact.
Cons: Good eyesight required. Can get tedious switching between the puzzle and the clues.
The Bottom Line: Would make a great Christmas gift for the crossword enthusiast. It has certainly encouraged me to spend more time exercising my brain with crossword puzzles.
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| mizgnomer's Full Review: Excalibur Electronic New York Times Electronic Tou... |
I've always been a big fan of puzzles, especially logic and crossword puzzles. I cannot tell you how many puzzle-books I've written in down through the years, but the number would be quite large. I recently got into doing crossword puzzles on-line, but I get tired of spending so much time in front of my computer. When I started seeing ads for the Excalibur New York Times Touch-Screen Crossword Puzzle game I was very interested and curious, but couldn't find any information on how easy to use and/or fun it was. I eventually found one fairly cheap brand-new on eBay, and decided to give it a try. So far I've been pretty pleased with my purchase...
Product Description:
Excalibur's New York Times Touch-Screen Crossword Puzzle is like a PDA for crossword lovers, programmed with 1000 New York Times crossword puzzles. It measures just over 5 inches long, 3½ inches wide, and is less than 1 inch thick. The play-screen is 2 inches wide and 2½ inches tall. It is very lightweight. The stylus is stored in a slot on the back of the unit, and stays put very well. The game casing is a sharp silver with black writing.
The upper portion of the screen is dedicated to the crossword puzzle, with a grid 15 boxes tall and wide. This is also the screen where menus and clues are displayed. Along the bottom of the screen is the tiny touch-screen keyboard, with "keys" in QWERTY-keyboard order. I put "keys" in quotation marks because they really aren't raised keys or buttons; instead they are painted-on areas on the touch-screen for you to touch with your stylus. Other "keys" located at the bottom of the unit include:
+ Menu key - where you can turn the sounds on or off, and adjust the display contrast
+ On/Off key - powers off the unit -- games are automatically saved when the unit is turned off
+ New Game key - for when you don't feel like finishing the game you are currently on
+ Clue key - switches the display screen from the puzzle grid to the clues or vice versa
+ Spell key - checks your answers, replacing all incorrect letters with a "spell-check" icon
+ Delete key - takes you to the delete menu, where you can choose to delete a letter, word, or entire puzzle
+ Solve puzzle - solves the puzzle you currently have loaded
+ Solve word - solves the word (across, down, or both) where your icon is currently located
+ Solve letter - fills in the letter where you cursor is currently located
There is also a light button on the side of the unit -- when you press it for one second the screen's backlight will come on so you can play in the dark. A reset button is located on the back of the unit, for use if the game starts to malfunction.
To conserve batteries, there is also an auto shut-off feature that will power-down the unit after 3 minutes of inactivity.
The Excalibur New York Times Electronic Touch-Screen Crossword Puzzle takes 2 "AAA" batteries (not included), and you will need a tiny Phillips-head screwdriver to get into the battery compartment.
How to Play:
When you start a new game, you must select a skill level. The options are Easy, Medium, Hard, and Mixed (which selects randomly from the 3 levels). After you select a level, the 3-digit numbers of the puzzles corresponding to that level will be displayed on the screen. You select one of the puzzles to begin play. You can keep up with the numbers that correspond to the puzzles you've already played, or you can compete with others (by giving them the number of the puzzle to play) and see who finishes the fastest.
When the puzzle is displayed, the boxes (where the letters go) are blank, and blanks between the words are marked by black (colored in) boxes. Unlike most crossword puzzles, the numbers that correspond with the clues are NOT in the upper-corners of the boxes. Instead, you must touch the "clue" button with your stylus to read the clues. The clues are based on where your cursor is on the puzzle (your cursor is denoted by a little flashing circle). When you switch over to the clue screen, the clue for the "across" word is at the top, and the clue for "down" is at the bottom. Above each clue are blanks and/or letters that correspond with the blocks on the puzzle, showing you how long the word is and how many letters you've filled in so far (this is very handy, since you can no longer see the puzzle when you are viewing the clues). To answer, you must press switch back to the puzzle screen (by pressing "clue" again), then start to type (with your stylus). After you type the first letter, arrows will point across and down next to the letter your just typed -- press either the across-arrow or down-arrow so that the next letter you type will go into the appropriate box.
If you type something in incorrectly, you can delete it. When you press the delete key you are taken to a menu that asks if you want to delete a letter, word, or the entire puzzle. If you select word, it further prompts you on whether you want to delete the word "across" or "down".
There are also "solve" keys. Like the delete key, you can solve at the letter, word, or puzzle level. The game prompts you (such as "Solve Word? Y/N") to make sure you didn't press the key accidentally, before solving. Another "cheat" key that doesn't feel quite so much like cheating is the "spell" key, which checks the entire puzzle for incorrect answers, and switches any incorrect answers or misspellings to "spell-check" icons (which are little squares) for as long as your are touching the "spell" button.
When you finish the entire puzzle, the time it took you to solve it is displayed on the screen.
Our Experiences:
So far I have had a lot of fun with my Excalibur New York Times Touch-Screen Crossword game. As I mentioned above, I've always been a bit of a puzzle fanatic. My house is full of crossword books and logic game books that are full of solved-puzzles and scribbled answers. There are lots of things that I love about this touch-screen game. It is so small and compact it certainly doesn't take up much as much storage space as my old half-used puzzle books, and because you don't "write" the answers I will be able to re-work the same puzzles at a later date (surely after I solve puzzle #1000 I'll have forgotten the answers to puzzle #1). Also, because I like working a puzzle or two before going to bed, I love the fact that the screen is backlit -- that way I don't bother my husband with bright lamps shining when he's trying to sleep. The ability to turn the sounds up and modify the contrast is also great. The sounds are fairly simple -- just one beep to let you know you've touched a valid key successfully, and a different-sounding beep when you are touching something invalid (such as when you are trying to put in letters, but the game wants you to tell it whether you want your answer to go across or down). I love the auto-save -- you can turn the game off at any point and turn it back on later to find yourself exactly where you left off. It's like you never left.
I must admit that some of the functionality is a bit tedious to use, however I've quickly grown accustomed to it. When I discovered that you had to switch out the entire screen just to get from the puzzle to the clues, I figured the constant switching back and forth would drive me crazy, however that's one aspect that ended up not bothering me much after I got used to it. The one that still bothers me the most is the need to hit the across-or-down arrow when you start filling in an answer. It really annoys me to start typing, then have to stop and go up to the puzzle area and select an arrow, then go back to finish typing in the rest of the word. I wish I could just type the entire word in somewhere and then say whether it goes across or down.
The other thing that really annoys me is that there is no way to cancel out of the delete menu. I've accidentally hit the "delete" key a time or two, only to end up at the menu (where you choose to delete a letter, word, or the entire puzzle) with no way out. Even if you turn the unit off, when you turn it back on you are still at the delete menu. To get out I delete a letter, then go fix whatever I just messed up.
The screen is nice and all, but it isn't particularly fancy or anything. The graphics are very dot-matrix-like, and there is no color. It's not a big deal, and I'm sure a fancier screen would up the price even more.
I have been using it pretty heavily for the past couple of weeks, frequently with the backlight on, and the batteries are still holding up well. I think it just might be a heartbreaking experience if I was almost done with a difficult puzzle that had taken me a while to solve and the batteries suddenly went dead. That would definitely be a downside to the electronic revolution of crossword puzzles.
Maybe I'm a bit strange, but there are times when I do miss the old paper-and-pen method. There's just a simplicity to it that I miss, or maybe I just like writing in books. Another possible negative -- getting the answers to "hard" parts of the puzzle is so easy, you might find yourself doing it more often than you would if you had to flip to the back of your book. Personally, I use the heck out of the "spell" key (which warns you when you've answered something incorrectly) -- that's something you certainly can't get from a book.
Improvements I would make, if only I could:
~) Allow people to type in the answer on the clue screen, which would keep you from having to select that blasted across/down arrow
~) Of course if I had my way, clues would show up on the same screen as the puzzle itself, however I realize that there is a real-estate shortage on the screen, so that might be hard to do.
~) I would definitely add a letter-delete key to the screen - it is one I use frequently and I hate having to go to a sub-menu for it.
~) If we had to keep the delete sub-menu, I would definitely add a "cancel" selection or some way to back out without deleting anything. I might also add a way to just delete any incorrect letters (which is what I'm usually trying to do when I delete anyway).
~) I would add the ability to upload additional puzzles. Sure, 1000 seems like a lot, but the technology exists to allow uploads so why not use it?
~) I do love the "spell" button (that checks for any incorrect letters on the puzzle), but wish there was some way to blanket-delete those letters, or at least leave them marked as incorrect.
Quickie Summary
Pros:
+) 1000 New York Times crossword puzzles!
+) Sleek, PDA-like design
+) Compact, very portable
+) Touch-screen technology w/ a stylus
+) 3 levels of difficulty (easy, medium, hard)
+) Can turn sounds off or on
+) Can adjust contrast to compensate for different lighting situations
+) Puzzles are automatically saved when you turn the unit off
+) Backlit, for use in the dark
+) Hint keys can solve a letter, word, or the entire puzzle
+) Very cool "spell" key alerts you to incorrect letters in the puzzle
+) Auto-save allows you to quit and come back without missing a beat
+) Auto power-off
+) Quite easy to use
+) Lots of fun!
Cons:
-) Must switch between puzzle-screen and clues
-) Excellent eyesight is a requirement - the puzzle is quite small
-) Cannot cancel out of the delete menu, so if you get there accidentally you still must delete something
-) Dot-matrix graphics are fine, but certainly not top-of-the-line quality
-) Some of the navigation is tedious (such as telling the system whether your answer is to go across or down as you are in the middle of typing it)
-) Possibly negative for some - it is so easy to check for wrong answers or solve words that you don't know, you might find yourself doing it more frequently than you would otherwise
Final Thoughts:
Personally, I've used the heck out of my Excalibur New York Times Touch-Screen Crossword Puzzle game. I would highly recommend it. It would make an excellent gift for people who like gadgets and crossword puzzles.
Note: There is now a new & improved version of the New York Times Crossword Puzzle Handheld (version II) from Excalibur. The main difference is that the screen is slightly longer, devoting 4 lines of the screen to the clues (so there is some scrolling involved, but at least you don't have to keep switching out the screen). It also comes in a leather case. The price is higher ($99) -- I'm not sure the changes are worth the $50 price difference between the two models, but at least you have more options now!
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 48.00
Type of Toy: Game
Age Range of Child: Whole Family
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Epinions.com ID:
mizgnomer
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Location: Tennessee
Reviews written: 306
Trusted by: 204 members
About Me:
Don't meddle in the affairs of dragons, for you're crunchy and taste good with ketchup
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