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Bookworm Adventures Deluxe: PC Game Review By: Vivian Tam Title: Bookworm Adventures Deluxe Your spelling puzzle adventure begins at the Great Library. You're a green nerdy bookworm named Lex. A professor named Codex startles you with an open mythology book. He shows you a scribbling on a page from an oracle, Cassandra, asking for help. Codex summons a magic pen and transports you into the book where you begin fighting enemies in a heroic attempt to rescue Cassandra. It's cute. In the adventure mode, where you begin, you are Lex going chapter through chapter defeating enemies in a book. There are 3 books total. The adventure story continues with each enemy you kill. Sometimes, the dialogue is rather entertaining in that geeky parody of RPGs sort of way. But you'll probably just find yourself clicking through it. It's not so important. Now on with the game. Basically, you form words to attack your enemy. The longer the word, the better your attack. Unlike Bookworm Deluxe, the letters do not have to be chained in order to form a word. You can pick any letter you want no matter where they are. You and your enemies take turns attacking. Both Lex and the enemies have a fun variety of attacks and bonuses which breaks up the monotony of a usual spelling game. The game also encourages you to spell a variety of words by including bonus words. For example, some enemies take a huge hit if you attack them with any 'metal' word. You'll collect a different treasure item at the end of each chapter which you can equip to better your defense or improve your attacks. True to PopCap's Bejeweled gem glory, there are also gem letter bonuses that you acquire as you progress in the game. When used in a word, these sparkling gems can help improve your attack. Some may cause an enemy to lose their turn, unless blocked. Some also delightfully heal you as well. But mostly, they make your game board colorful and exciting. There's just something about gems that makes everything a little bit more addictive... Each fight gets progressively harder because of the increasing skill levels of the enemies. Their special powers, immunities, and attack bonuses can take you out rather quickly. So, it does pay to use some strategy and equip yourself with relevant treasure items. But mostly, spell long words. At the end of each chapter is a boss fight. I did die a couple times here. Death to Lex means a trip to a mini-games tent where you can play a quickie variation of a spelling game to earn health, power boosts, potions and bonus gems. You restart at the beginning of the chapter with the same set of letters you died with. For me, it was often a return to a mass of J's, Z's, and U's. You can get a new "deck" of random tiles by scrambling them, but you lose a turn. Oh, the strategy that's involved! The mini-games are 3 different spelling games: Word Master, Letter Rip, and Link n' Spell. Word Master is sort of a hang-man game using process of elimination to guess the mystery word in 5 rounds. In Letter Rip, you spell as many words as you can from the letters of randomly picked word. In Link n' Spell, you try to form words from random letter tiles in order to turn a row of letters into gold. After you've played all the mini-games while in the adventure mode, the mini-games mode is unlocked. The arena mode in Bookworm Adventures is unlocked after you've completed the adventure mode. In Arenas, your turns are timed and as long as you stay alive, it is an endless fight. My champion word for the evening was "EQUATORIAL." The "E" was a sapphire gem, adding 25% damage. I also happened to be equipped with Quadrumvir Signet, which gave me a bonus for using "QUA" in a word. And my "R" was also a double bonus. So yes, I obliterated my enemy with one shot. These power kills are family-friendly versions of the fatality kills in Mortal Kombat, but are just as satisfying. Care to challenge my word attack? Bookworm Adventures has just enough challenge, is visually adorable, and is task-switchable so you can happily play as you talk about those important numbers during your conference call. I'd also recommend it as a great kid's edutainment game (ugh, I said 'edutainment'). I give Bookworm Adventures 8 out of 10 wormies. If Bookworm Adventures is up your alley, you might also enjoy Steve Jackson's Munchkin card game and Mario Teaches Typing.
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