| - By Lance Hemenway | | | | renaissance of sorts. Sales of board games |
| | | | in general, and more specifically, word |
| They're almost everywhere. Hiding within | | | | games, have increased dramatically. |
| small libraries, or huddled in the | | | | |
| dark-frightened of the daylight. -People who | | | | In regards to online gaming, the situation is |
| play word games; the rare and talented | | | | similar. Downloadable games continue to find |
| individual who actually delights in the | | | | their way into almost every household. And |
| flirtation between language and | | | | it is in this respect that word games have |
| entertainment. But who are these bizarre | | | | really found their niche. Computer gamers |
| people? Why do they play these word oriented | | | | have spent thousands of their free hours |
| games? And are the rest of us in any real | | | | online stimulating their little brains till |
| danger? | | | | their heart's content. |
| | | | |
| Word games have existed for a long time. | | | | For example, the game "Love Letters," a new |
| Looking for words and phrases in a series of | | | | title available on Jenkat Games. ( The game |
| mixed up letters has been with us since | | | | combines the flavor of Scrabble with the |
| civilizations have been able to put pen to | | | | framework of your typical video game |
| papyrus. Anagrams, palindromes, lexigrams, | | | | experience. Released just in time for |
| and puns have all found their way into our | | | | Valentine's Day, Love letters allows players |
| lives at one time or another. People like | | | | to search about in a box of candy hearts, |
| being able to engage their minds while being | | | | searching for the proper letters to spell |
| entertained. Of course, there are some | | | | words provided them on a list. The farther |
| people who prefer not to be bothered with | | | | you proceed, the more words you have to |
| "Intellectual stimulation" during their | | | | assemble. |
| entertainment. -And those people watch | | | | |
| "Cops." | | | | Word games are staging a bit of a comeback. |
| | | | And in many ways, they never lost favor at |
| For some time, games like Boggle, or | | | | all. Many people have discovered that word |
| Scrabble, did seem to disappear into the | | | | games have increased their ability to focus, |
| distant haze of our early childhood memories. | | | | and concentrate for longer periods of time. |
| And it was true, that during the immense | | | | Gamers have shown their love for word games |
| growth spurt of the video game industry, | | | | in all of its various forms, while game |
| puzzle games, in general, officially lost | | | | manufactures attempt to feed the growing |
| favor with the public nation wide. But in | | | | demand. Word games are not only a big part |
| the last few years, with the growing amount | | | | of gaming as a whole, they are a growing part |
| of imported board games from countries like | | | | of video-gaming as well. And that fact |
| Germany, board games have been through a | | | | doesn't seem to be changing anytime soon. |