Clockwords

October 1, 2009 12:29 AM

Clockwords. Type words to destroy robotic insects intent on stealing your secrets.

Fair warning: there's a pay-to-unlock-more-powerful-letters scheme buried in there, but the free content is still worthwhile IMO.

posted by juv3nal (27 comments total)

Type words to destroy robotic insects intent on stealing your secrets.

Dude, that's my day job.
posted by rokusan at 12:38 AM on October 1, 2009 [2 favorites]

This is a pretty interesting twist on my day job in which I am a robotic insect intent on stealing rokusan's secrets.
posted by stresstwig at 12:54 AM on October 1, 2009 [8 favorites]

Neat game, though. A bit too complicated for a 'casual' game (The Boiler? Why bother?) but neat anyway.
posted by rokusan at 1:00 AM on October 1, 2009

A shitastic video ad ruins the whole experience from the start. It flickers on an off, eventually becomes invisible, but its audio is still playing as the game's audio begins to play, too. F-minus.
posted by Mo Nickels at 1:28 AM on October 1, 2009

Dear Stresstwig,

When we hired you as a spy, we were pretty explicit about the whole "not telling people that you're stealing intel from them" thing. You have greatly dissipointed the Gay Jewish Illuminati Reptiloid Consortium, and we will be docking 0.12 freedom dollars from your next paycheck.

Sincerely,

-General [Classified, but my name rhymes with Hilbert Hodfrey]

..Anyway, I am enjoying this. It is a little bit stressful, as it should be.
posted by Uppity Pigeon #2 at 1:48 AM on October 1, 2009 [1 favorite]

I just watched a commercial. Wow. Thanks, juv3nal, for directing me to that.
posted by sidereal at 2:51 AM on October 1, 2009

Pepsi Gold.
posted by johnny novak at 3:04 AM on October 1, 2009

Interesting how in times of stress I forget things like that bestial is not spelled beastial.
posted by BrotherCaine at 4:03 AM on October 1, 2009

Hm. Firefox with Adblock and NoScript, and no commercial at all, except for the "Word of the Day" feature in the game (which I imagine is clever co-development or placement from dictionary.com).

Great game! Thanks for posting!
posted by Shepherd at 4:08 AM on October 1, 2009

hmm... level 10 is tough. Anyone get any further without buying letters (or it could be my brain is fried).
posted by nielm at 4:28 AM on October 1, 2009

Yeah I'm on fifteen. It's quirky, and the difficulty is often related to how many of a given letter is in your boiler. I'm typing 'jailbreaks' quite often because I have Js and Bs coming up all the time.
posted by BrotherCaine at 4:32 AM on October 1, 2009

Wow. This the ultimate Scrabble training regime.
posted by embrangled at 5:51 AM on October 1, 2009

Typing and collecting letters is easy, but the boiler "Transmute" option messes with my brain. It's not intuitive at all.
posted by misha at 6:13 AM on October 1, 2009 [1 favorite]

Stealing secrets, eh? I'm still waiting for a "Dr. Strangelove" Flash game where you're General Jack D. Ripper, and you must defend against the godless hordes who would steal our precious bodily fluids and the purity of our essence. Press 'K' to launch Slim Pickens.
posted by Hardcore Poser at 6:39 AM on October 1, 2009

I just watched a commercial. Wow. Thanks, juv3nal, for directing me to that.

Apologies. Like Shepherd, I run firefox with adblock so I never saw any ad.
posted by juv3nal at 10:35 AM on October 1, 2009

Excellent game, but ought to recognise the verbosity of a flamboyant yet expansive lexicon.

Rats. I don't know why I bother.
posted by Acey at 10:48 AM on October 1, 2009

Christ, stop acting like you've been personally violated for having to watch an advertisement. The game is pretty sweet. I think it'd be cooler if you had to type certain words at certain times. I really enjoy the challenge of trying to quickly come up with a word using all the letters in the pipe.
posted by autodidact at 12:03 PM on October 1, 2009

Ninety minutes gone. The boiler is silly, yes. But I had fun.
posted by HeroZero at 4:47 PM on October 1, 2009

No ad here. My husband and I got to level 23 last night, and thought it was great fun. The two-player option of one person typing and one aiming is also cool. I like the way it makes my mind work, instead of the typical brainless games that simply reward fast reflexes and good hand-eye coordination.

The Boiler is simple, and not silly when you get up to the higher levels - you just have to match letters with the same number of dots and combine them. Higher damage levels become necessary soon enough. When you get brass and jade letters, it starts getting really entertaining. :)

Thanks, juv3nal!
posted by po at 8:08 PM on October 1, 2009

There is, of course, the functionality to "Skip This Ad" but I know some people like to complain about nothing.

Nicely designed game, but should probably stop right now, since I'm at work.
posted by crossoverman at 8:50 PM on October 1, 2009

I have no citation but I believe that 'stewardesses' is the longest word you can touch type with your left hand.
posted by geekyguy at 9:31 PM on October 1, 2009

What's your right hand doing while you're thinking about stewardesses?
posted by rokusan at 10:50 PM on October 1, 2009

Enjoyed this... Thanks for the link.
posted by benzo8 at 12:02 AM on October 2, 2009

This game makes it really obvious that I have a large vocabulary and really atrocious spelling. My greatest failures in this game come from the times when I have a great word that uses all the letters, but apparently can't spell it....

And, of course, from the limitations of the dictionary.
posted by sotonohito at 8:53 AM on October 2, 2009

After level 15 I start bogging down. My brain just doesn't move fast enough, laterally, for me to keep up. Good news is, I suppose playing this game will help with that.

I wish there was some way to turn the freakin' music off.
posted by Shepherd at 9:46 AM on October 2, 2009

Just found this out today: the story, such as it is (further chapters are supposed to flesh it out more), was written by Emily Short.
posted by juv3nal at 2:47 PM on October 2, 2009

And, of course, from the limitations of the dictionary.

Yeah, the lack of prefixes and suffixes in the game dictionary kept killing me until I realized what was going on.
posted by BrotherCaine at 6:53 PM on October 2, 2009