IsoWords is currently available in 4 languages: English, Spanish, French and German. So, who has the best players? I will be using two metrics to determine this: highest scoring words and highest free game scores. Here are the current standings for all languages:

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I just noticed that IsoWords passed a huge milestone: over 100,000 scores have been submitted to the leaderboards. Approximately 500 games are submitted to the leaderboards everyday. Below are some screenshots of the leaderboards to highlight the amazing scores/words people have found.

English IsoWords: Highest scoring words and top free play scores

Spanish IsoWords: Highest scoring words and top free play scores

French IsoWords: Highest scoring words and top free play scores

I just submitted an update for all versions of IsoWords (bringing the version to 1.1.5) with iOS 4 compatibility. All this means really is that IsoWords is now compatible with the “fast switching” version of multitasking. So, you can exit IsoWords, go into other apps and do other things, and then come back to IsoWords and it will resume exactly where you left off.

This version does not include high resolution artwork for the new iPhone 4, so you will not get any extra crispness on those devices. Another update will be coming soon though, as well as new game announcements…

Update: I should also clarify that this update is backwards compatible with OS 3.0, so the newest iPhone OS is not needed. Although, without iOS 4 the update doesn’t do anything…

The 1.1 update of IsoWords has been out for over a week, and over 25,000 games and words have been submitted to the leaderboards. Up until this point I was used to dominating all my friends at this game, but now I see I am barely hanging onto the top (btw, if we aren’t friends on Facebook or Twitter then my scores will show up under “mbrandonw”).

Words

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For those who haven’t played IsoWords yet, the score of a word is determined by both the rarity of the letters used and the length. Every letter is given a point value just like in scrabble (A=1 pt, B=3 pts, etc). So to get the score of a word I first add up the points for each letter, and then I multiply by the length of the word minus 2. I subtract 2 so that 3 letter word does not get multiplied at all, a 4 letter word gets multiplied by 2, and so on.

The highest scoring word leaderboard is pretty much the only leaderboard for which I am at the top. My QUIZZER and MINERALIZE finds are just barely hanging onto the #1 and #2 spots. I also hold 5 of the other top 40 word scores, including QUANTIZE, QUARTZY (of which I didn’t actually know was a word until I tried submitting it) and SQUABBLE. However, someone who goes by the handle “danisse” is the most prominent in this leaderboard with 12 of the top 40 words belonging to him/her. Also, so many high scoring words have been submitted that it takes at least a 120 point word to break into the top 40 all time leaderboard.

In the Spanish version of IsoWords, also known as IsoWords.es, there have been over 2,000 words submitted, and there is currently a 3 way tie for #1: CARROCEROS, AQUEJARAS and RAZONABLE. More amazing to me is the 11 letter word that Carlos Sánchez found, DESCANSARAS, even though it was only worth 126 points.

Games

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My favorite game type in IsoWords is free play. It can be soothing to sit down with a puzzle for 30 minutes or longer, trying to piece together every prefix, suffix and root word you can find for long words. Before releasing the 1.1 update for IsoWords I had never broken the 900 point barrier. So, imagine my dismay when I saw the free play leaderboard on the right. 1,120 points?! Incroyable! This “danisse” person is just freakin’ awesome…

Daily Challenge

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I had some reservations about implementing the daily challenge feature. My fear was that it would not be used very much, making it a creepy, isolated place where you get 1st place just if you participate for that day. However, people are using it. In fact, somewhere between 40 and 50 people play it everyday, which is a lot considering the relatively small number of people who participate in the leaderboards.

I’ve taken the 1st place spot in 2 of the daily challenges, both of which just barely nudged “danisse” out of the top spot. So, in the end I am glad I took the time to implement this, and I hope it becomes more popular as IsoWords gets more players.

The IsoWords 1.1 update went live on the App Store this past monday (Feb 22nd), so grab it if you haven’t already. I also dropped the price to $.99. The leaderboards seem to be very popular, with over 10,000 games and words submitted so far. It’s interesting seeing how good some people are at this game. In the Spanish version a player found the 11 letter word DESCANSARAS, which is pretty amazing, and in the English version a player broke the 1,000 point barrier in free play games.

I am very happy with the 1.1 update, but I quickly saw a few small shortcomings with the leaderboards once everyone started submitting their scores. For this reason I have just sent a small update to Apple with a few cosmetic changes.

The leaderboards show only the very top scores (top 20 for games and top 40 for words), so it was a little frustrating to not know out of how many games/words I was being ranked. So, the leaderboards now have a little header that give precisely this information (by the way, I’m dominating the word leaderboard )

Next, after playing the daily challenge you are taken to the game over screen with a little purple box at the bottom showing your current rank. When I saw this I immediately wanted know the scores of everyone else who had participated so far. So, now there is a button to bring the daily challenge calendar up directly from the game over screen.

Finally, I got a request from a Touch Arcade forum member to add an option for disabling all sounds in the game. This can now be done in the settings menu.

If anyone else has suggestions on how to improve the game I would love to hear them.

The 1.1 update to IsoWords has finally been submitted, and it looks amazing. Below are the new screenshots for the App Store. More information will come soon…