Text Tumble is a nifty little twist on word games developed by independent game developer, Magellan Media.

The Game

I… can’t… spell…!

Text Tumble can be described as “wordtris”, letters descend from the top of the screen, you guide them into places where they would make words, and you attempt to make combos to take advantage of score multipliers. In addition, there is a pictogram system that throws symbols your way, which have multiple word values, which you can link with other letters. For example, a cat symbol can be cat, tiger, tom, and puss, and you can throw letters before or after, such as “atom” or “catty”. The pictogram system is a nice little addition that I enjoyed, but because of how sporadic letters can be, they are often difficult to use.

The tetris-style of the game can be a blessing, but more often than not is quite the crutch. I ran into a lot of trouble forming words, more often than not getting really lucky with pictograms or random words appearing. In addition, the blocks fall quite fast right from the get-go and you will often be scrambling for positioning. On top of that, the playing area feels entirely cramped, being able to get five-ish letters per column max, you will run out of room quick. You can break tiles by swiping down with two fingers, but really you’re just running down your score multiplier and delaying the inevitable. A nice touch that I just realized was included was the dictionary in the pause function, in case you wish to look up words you have entered or wish to enter.

Graphics

Two letter words and ‘toker’, win.

Text Tumble doesn’t have very impressive graphics, considering it is just a word game, but they are decent. The letters are easily identifiable, the symbols are self explanatory, and the particles thrown around when you score are all passable. You will not have trouble reading anything, but there is certainly nothing impressive about the graphics.

Sound

There is no soundtrack in Text Tumble, but thankfully you can listen to your iPod while you play, which is perfect for casual play. The sound effects are minimal but they do the work, rewarding sounds of tiles dropping, words clearing, and the round ending make the game feel more polished and complete.

Additional Comments

Text Tumble has an online leaderboard that is mostly occupied by one person, so it might be a prime time to attack that leaderboard and find your way to number one. The leaderboard appears to be proprietary to Magellan Media, so it is very simple, but it gets the job done.

Conclusion

Text Tumble is really different from any word game I have played before, combining tetris-style block dropping and Word Scramble style word selection. A great casual game, but has plenty of shortcomings, would definitely recommend it to word lovers.

Score

MustTap Score: Iron Tap

It's technically solid, but what comes out is pretty plain.

Bottom Line
Text Tumble is a great game for word lovers, but definitely has some shortcomings. The pictograms are a nice touch but ultimately, the game gets tiring extremely fast. Definitely made for the word lovers.

Screenshots