As any word game fan knows, big words aren’t always big point-earners. You can drop a six-letter word like “TETHER” in Scrabble and, even though it’s somewhat interesting and will eat up a good chunk of the board, it’s not a spectacular move because:

1. It’s one letter short of a 50-point BINGO (Scrabble’s point bonus for using all your letters).
2. You may not reach one of the bonus tiles with it (most notably Triple Word Score).
3. The letters in “TETHER” are all low-value, worth one point apiece.
4. With a sprawling crossword, you’re opening up a LOT of options for your opponent to exploit.

Often in Scrabble, it’s the tiny, well-placed words that win the day, enabling you to re-score two additional words that are already on the board via clever linking.

A Word of a Different Colour

The same goes for Spellirium. Spelling a 7-letter word is fine, but if you want to send your score into the stratosphere, you need to make solidly-coloured words.

Here’s how the combo/chain system works:

Big scores are extremely important for dominating your friends and showing off your superior vocabulary and intellect. In Story Mode, you’ll need these points in order to craft power-ups. More on power-ups in a future post.

Word.