A word in your eye

Regular purchasers of puzzle magazines may be interested in the suite of programs that has just been released by Able-Soft. Word Puzzles is a collection of four programs, each sold separately, and each representing a popular type of word test.

These are all disc-based and fully menu driven - the menu options are consistent throughout the suite, so there's no confusion when switching between games. Each is essentially a puzzle editor, and comes complete with up to 24 ready-to-solve challenges.

Crossword requires no explanation. The puzzles are based around a 13x13 grid drawn in medium resolution black and white, and annotated with small, but perfectly legible, clue numbers.

Clues are called up individually by typing the appropriate clue number and a cursor is then positioned on the crossword in preparation for your response. The puzzle accepts any answer, correct or incorrect. The only clue to your degree of success is provided by pressing f0 which informs you how many of the letters already entered are wrong.

A printout option is included in the menu - this prints the crossword either with or without answers. What puzzles me is why it doesn't print the clues - you could then use it as a crossword generator for friends and colleagues.

Cross-fit is the second type of word puzzle - based on a crossword grid. Your task is to correctly position the answers on the grid, without the aid of clues.

The answers are grouped together as words of the same length. A group is displayed by pressing the number corresponding to the length of word required. Unfortunately the window used to display the list ofwords is only seven characters wide - words of eight or nine letters in length are therefore truncated.

There is only one correct solution for the puzzle, so an occasional press of f0 is advisable - just to keep a check on your progress.

Cross Reference is also based on a crossword design, but this time you're provided with neither clues nor answers. Each blank square in the grid contains a number in the range of 1 to 26 with each of these numbers representing a letter. To help you get started you are provided with the first three letters, and it is then up to you to determine which letters are represented by the remaining numbers.

This type of puzzle works quite well on paper, but the computer version can easily degenerate into a type it in and see exercise.

The final program in the suite is Crossgram - an anagram based word game. It is played in the same way as Crossword, but with a smaller grid and anagrams as clues. I found this and the original Crossword to be the best of the four programs.

Word Puzzles is an interesting collection of routines that have a limited lifespan. Once you've completed the examples, you are essentially limited to writing puzzles for other people.

Carol Barrow