#1 Anagrams

Genre: Puzzle

Players: 1

.

Review:

(Note: This game is included in #1 Anagrams Sudokus Bundle, along with #1 Sudokus. It is also included in #1 Crosswords Bundle, along with #1 Crosswords. In addition to that, all three above games are included in #1 Pastime Bundle)

#1 Anagrams is a Puzzle game released on Nintendo Switch in 2021. This is a type of game I’ve seen advertised a lot on mobile devices – you’re given a circle of letters, and you’re supposed to use those letters to form as many words as possible, in this game with the goal of filling in a Crossword-style puzzle with some of the words you can create.

The presentation is nothing special, but I suppose it works here. The 2D visuals are bright, colorful, and animated, and while this same presentation worked pretty poorly in #1 Sudokus and not at all in #1 Crosswords, I think it’s okay here. It’s not bad, but it’s definitely not great. In addition, this game uses music that I can only assume is fair use – I’ve heard the same music in the Travel Mosaics series.

What about the gameplay? This game features 200 puzzles in its “Story Mode” (which has absolutely no story). There’s also “random” and “daily” puzzles, but it’s unclear if this is just selecting from one of those 200 I previously mentioned.

The gamepad controls are awkward and clunky, but the game also supports touchscreen, which is clearly the better way to play here. And while puzzles do not contain all words you can create with a series of letters, the game still seems to recognize all words you can create, which will reset the game’s combo timer.

Really, I think the biggest problem #1 Anagrams has to face is just how ubiquitous this style of game has become on mobile devices, where you can get it for free and often with more features (though usually with ads). However, I suppose $4 isn’t a terrible price for this game, and players looking for something like this on Nintendo Switch will probably be satisfied, though certainly not blown away.

tl;dr – #1 Anagrams is a Puzzle game that has players creating as many words as they can using a selection of a few letters. The presentation isn’t great and the controls are clunky, but overall this is a decent Puzzle game, albeit one that’s widely available on mobile devices. However, if you want a version of the game on Nintendo Switch, this works.

Grade: C

^{You can support eShopperReviews on Patreon! Please click HERE to become a Sponsor!}

^{This month’s sponsors are Ben, Ilya Zverev, Andy Miller, Exlene, Homer Simpin, Johannes, Francis Obst, Gabriel Coronado-Medina, Jared Wark, Kristoffer Wulff, and Seth Christenfeld. Thank you for helping to keep the reviews coming!}