Alternatives
Products that do what A to Z – A word game I built from a childhood road trip memory does
Long time lurker here. My family had a pen-and-paper game we'd play on long drives to visit my great-grandmother. After she passed, I spent the holidays recreating it: https://a26z.fun How it works: Find 15 words from a category (like "Stone Fruits," "US States," or "Dog Breeds") as fast as you can. Once you meet the 15 word minimum, you can play for as long as you want. Each letter shows how many target words start with it (A¹ = one word starts with A, N² = two words start with N) That small ² in the bottom-right? Multi-word answers allowed. For "US States" with N², both "NEW…
- 1HA
This is a game I wrote over the last month and a bit. The effort allocation was pretty different from what I've done in the past. The game design snapped together very quickly: I had the initial idea, played a couple of games on a spreadsheet to get a feel for the idea, and made one change based on those plays. After that everything felt just right through multiple rounds of playtesting. Likewise the puzzle generation is nowhere near as elaborate as in my previous game, fairly simple methods worked well and provided good variety. Instead I ended up spending silly amounts of time on curating…
2024 · huewords.snellman.net
- 2OA
Hi everybody. I occasionally make little browser-based games, and this is my latest attempt. It's not quite done, but it's quite playable (note: it does include audio): https://www.omiword.com/ This has been my occasional tinker target for ~5 years now, starting in the early days of Covid. The objective is to drag letter tiles within certain boundaries to spell four common American-English words. It hasn't got ads or anything, it's just supposed to be fun for its own sake. If people happen to like it, I might add an option for folks to make a small, one-time payment to unlock…
2025 · omiword.com
- 3MG
Hi HN, My friend and I just launched a vocabulary quiz game. It's a two Player Game where you challenge your opponent with a word and answer their challenge question. Whoever gets the highest score in a round of 5, wins. Currently, words are from Barron's 333 most essential GRE wordlist to help students preparing for the standardized test. You can check out the game at: [Play Store] https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.buildmyvoc... or [Hybrid web app in Ionic - Please allow some time to load] https://buildmyvocab.in/wordsgame We would…
2017
- 4WSWord Slicer▲85
Hi. I created a small word game and would love someone to give it a try and let me know what you think. Thanks!
2024 · wordslicer.com
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I've been working on a simple multiplayer word game called Alphabet Soup. It's a bit like NYT Spelling Bee, except it's multiplayer and only your best (longest) word counts toward your score. So, instead of trying to find as many words as possible, the game is more about finding one unusually good word. You can play with friends in a private match, or, you can join a public Arena match to play against other players who are online. If no one else is around, you'll be matched with a bot. The game works well with just 2 players, but, also works with bigger groups since the game isn't…
28d ago · alphabetsoup.club
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- 8AE
I built a procedurally generated word-search game where the puzzle never ends - as you scroll, the grid expands infinitely and new words appear. It’s designed to be quick to pick up, satisfying to play, and a little addictive. The core game works without an account using the pre-defined games, but signing up allows you to generate games using any topic you can think of. I’d love feedback on gameplay, performance, and whether the endless format feels engaging over time. If you try it, I’d really appreciate any bug reports or suggestions. Thanks in advance!
Dec 2025 · endless-wordsearch.com
- 9IB
The idea is to get from a starting word to a target word by creating a list of words to go in the middle. You can only change one letter at a time. Yesterday's words: https://twitter.com/ChangelistGame/status/1518695582151237632 Today's game: https://changelist.rocks/
2022
- 10SW
I just finished my first iOS game, Snack Words, which is a real-time, multi-player word finding game. iTunes link: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/snack-words/id425786167?mt=8&ls=1 YouTube video demo: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zPQuqoUHqU I wanted to build something very simple and minimal. There's no figuring out who to play, and each game is only 90 seconds long. The backend is 2,400 lines (so short!) of Erlang which speaks a custom protocol (length tagged JSON packets) to the client. The Objective-C side protocol implementation makes heavy use of blocks and works a lot like my…
2011
- 11NL
I've been playing Wordle and remembered this puzzle game I used to play with my grandfather. It's inspired by the block puzzles in many newspapers but made to be shorter: just guess the nine letter word. So I made a quick thing to play with my family like we used to. I thought you guys might enjoy it.
2022 · nineletterwordgame.com
- 12WZ
Hi HN! This is a word search game I launched in the beginning of this year - didn't get much traction then, but it's been posted around a bit (right now getting some traffic from kottke.org) and now has over 12,000 words found! Now that it's a little more filled out I figured I'd share it again. Really enjoying seeing what everyone is making on it - it appears most people start by just adding a few words to the big clump in the middle, then adding to other people's projects (or ruining them) and finally working on their own little concepts. My favorite is the kitty to the north. Hope you…
Jan 2026 · words.zip
- 13CA
How to play: 1. You're given a set of letters (such as "ZXCVBNM") 2. Come up with two words that use all the letters (like "convex zombie") 3. The shorter the words, the better!
2025 · wilf.live
- 14WC
Hi everyone, I got this idea for a game where, starting from a four letter word you need to go as deep as you can in your vocabulary, changing only one letter per word. bear -> beer -> peer... Each correct word gives you 1 point Each incorrect word takes one life away from you, you start with 3
Jun 2026 · victorribeiro.com
- 151W
A few months ago I shared 18 Words, Zanagrams and Sunflowers here, which loads of you ended up playing and sending really useful feedback. I’ve now brought all three together into PZL games along with three new daily games. Just wanted to say thanks to everyone here who played, commented and helped improve them. HN has been a big part of getting these games off the ground. I'v now had over 1 million players across them. Would love to hear what you think of the new site, and any feedback is very welcome.
10d ago
- 16IM
Hi everyone, Wanted to share a game I built. It's called Unscramble! and I believe it's the simplest word building game. Rules: You get a few letters on screen. You need to make one word with all the letters. Tap a letter to select. Tap again to deselect. Faster you go, better you score. If you enter anagrams of the word it's looking for, it gives you extra points. If you are stuck, you can either "Ask Friend" or get Hint. You get extra points for getting the word fast but you don't get penalized for taking too long. I believe the simplicity of the game along with big touch buttons makes it…
3d ago
- 17IM
English is my second language. From my experience, I learnt that developing your vocabulary is a long and arduous process. Traditionally, learners used flashcards (or their digital incarnations). I wanted to build something more engaging and more effective in building your vocabulary. DictionaryGames is aimed mostly at ESL (English as a Second Language) students, but I am hoping it might be fun for any English language lovers. The project is in BETA, it is free, and no registration is required. I am looking for feedback to improve it. If you comment, please indicate if you are a native…
2025 · dictionarygames.io
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- 19MN
This is an idea I’ve been kicking around for a long time, and I decided to finally code it up. In the same way that Scrabble decomposes words into letters, what if there was a game that decomposed letters into sub-shapes? There’s a lot of directions this could go, and I’m still exploring the possibility space. Enjoy. Suggestions welcome. It doesn’t have a real name yet.
2024 · shovemedia.com
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- 22AW
Looking for honest feedback!
Feb 2026 · subletters.fun
- 23QA
Hey HN, Today I'm launching Quorbo (www.quorbo.com): a simple letter-revealing game (think Wheel of Fortune with some twists) where you get 6 turns to guess the day's quote! It's my first post-parenthood side project and first web game. Being a working dad has caused me (for the first time, believe it or not) to focus on simplicity. Up until about a year ago, endless free time secretly plagued me... because I love _building_, and more free time meant: more room to add complexity. Not anymore! Quorbo is the first of my initial batch of three simple word games, and I can't wait to make more.…
2023 · quorbo.com
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