Textropolis is a text twisting game for the iPhone that lets you vicariously travel the world, if cartoon buildings and faceless people represent the world. Like Chicktionary and Word Warp, the object of this app is to form new words from the letters of one big word. In Textropolis, the initial words are city names.

Textropolis was developed by Ian Marsh of NimbleBit. This app is a word game with side effects: As you create more words, both the buildings and the population grow in the city. You can earn up to ten stars in each city, and when you get to two stars, the next city unlocks. If you get stuck, you can exchange 100 people for a hint. The hints are basically the first letter of a word with the word’s definition. Most are giveaways, like N_ _ _ _: The plural of nose.

An annoying thing about Textropolis, as with most word games, is that some of the vocabulary is totally obscure. In contrast, one of the best parts of Textropolis is that you do get word definitions. I did not know that a gink is a foolish or contemptible man, for example, nor did I know the word wogs, which is Australian slang for a minor form of illness (plural).

There is no time limit when you play Textropolis, and you can pick up where you left off or hop between cities. The initial word is not in a straight line, which is not my preference, but maybe it helps you to see more words. Unfortunately you cannot scramble the letters to get a fresh perspective.

Textropolis starts you off with 30 cities. I wonder if NimbleBit will add more cities in the future? You might get through them rather quickly if you’re good at word games. Textropolis is a decent app, but Chicktionary remains my favorite word game app.

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category: Games, Word, Worthwhile Apps