Speed is the name of the game in Clamor, as those who have played for a while know.  With bonus points awarded for each second left on the clock, as well as heft round bonuses, more games are won through finishing a round early than any other way.  With this in mind, here's a few tips to dramatically cut down your time, increase your score, and beat up on your competitors:  

Power-ups

The right combination of power-ups is essential.  Everyone has their favorite combinations, so make sure to     experiment with mixing and matching.  My go-to combo is two Freezes and a Swap.

Two- and three-letter words

A fairly comprehensive knowledge of legal two- and three-letter words can help you get out of a tight spot, and can dramatically increase the speed with which you can place letters onto the board.  I have had many games where the majority of the words I create consist of these small words.  Words such "qi," "za," and "xi" can also help you unload these difficult letters.  

Experiment with both game modes

Some people play more quickly in Drag Mode, others in Tap Mode.  I encourage you to play with both modes, in order to see which one works most effectively works with your play style.

Move letters around

Don't forget that you can move letters around after they've been placed on the board.  This can help get you out of a tight spot.  Also, switching two letters is as easy as tapping one then tapping the other, which makes quick work of an innocent mistake.  

These are a few tips and hints that I've found have helped improve my time and score.  Practicing them should help you improve your game as well.  I look forward to seeing you in the future.  As always, feel free to challenge me.  My username is "Jedediah."  

Greetings, fellow logophiles. For a limited time, Clamor is available for free in iTunes. There's never been a better time to see what everyone is clamoring about. Now, with even more people playing, you'll never have to wait long to play the quickest, brainiest, most fun word game on the market. 

New players will receive 20 free tokens just for downloading the game, as well as the Daily Bonus, where players are rewarded with up to 20 tokens each day just by logging in. Use these tokens to play an array of power-ups, in order to truly unlock your full scoring potential.  

Currently on the leaderboards in over 19 countries, Clamor is poised to transform the word game genre. Don't miss out on a single minute of gameplay, download Clamor today!!

 

The newest, greatest Clamor, Version 1.2, is now available from the App Store and iTunes. This update includes lots of new features:

• Push notifications show you when it's your turn to play
• Supports iPhone 5 resolution
• Improved Blank Power-up UI/Ux
• Finished and Waiting game scores can now be viewed by tapping the game in Main Menu
• New sound effects

If you have already been playing Clamor, thank you, and we hope you enjoy these improvements. If you haven't yet played, there's no better time to start seeing what everybody's clamoring about.  

We're not finished though, so keep an eye out for the next update, with even more improvements and features.  

Clamor, the exciting new word game from Big Idea Games is now available on iTunes. 

Clamor is a fun, fast-paced two-player word game; a mash-up of the best parts of Bananagrams and Scrabble, but with so much more. Gone are the days of having to wait a day or more for your opponent to play a single word.  With the ability to have up to 25 simultaneous games, you'll always have the opportunity to play a round or two.  

Speed is the name of the game in Clamor. Each game consists of three 2-minute rounds, wherein players receive the same pool of 33 randomly drawn letters to build a board full of legal words, crossword style.  

Scores increase through strategic use of available power-ups and bonus tiles. Earn massive bonus points by finishing a round before the 2-minute timer expires. The player with the highest score at the end of the third round wins.

As always, please don't hesitate to give us feedback. We are feverishly working on the first update, with many improvements and added features, so check back soon for more exciting Clamor news.

We hope to see you on the Clamor leaderboards soon!

Most of the questions I've fielded since the recent release of Luminary on Facebook have been in regards to our use of the Unity game engine.  Hopefully, the following will answer any questions that one may have regarding this issue.  

Visual 3-D quality

Unity wins hands-down on 3-D visual quality over both Flash and Shockwave, offering console-like 3-D graphics in web browser. While flash and Shockwave both have 3-D capabilities to varying degrees, neither offer modern hardware-accelerated 3-D graphics, making use of modern shaders, visual effects and rendering speed.

Engine Performance

The Unity web player executes code many times faster than Flash or Shockwave (the Unity website says, "20x faster than Flash or Director based JavaScript"), and combined with the built-in "Ageia PhysX" physics engine means that it's able to execute realistic 3-D physics, complex AI and other intensive gameplay-specific code very smoothly.

Plug-in install process

Unity has a very quick and simple install process, with no additional payloads (unlike Flash's "McAfee security scan" or Shockwave's "Norton security scan,” or any other "helpful" toolbars, etc). In addition, it can be installed on windows without requiring an administrator account!

Plug-in penetration

A common criticism of Unity as a choice of web plug-in is that it has a low level of penetration.  Flash, and even Shockwave, have much higher levels of plug-in penetration than Unity. However, plugin penetration levels matter less than they used to because most home users now have broadband, which makes the actual download time negligible.

As a company, these are some of the reasons that we have decided to use Unity for all of our games currently in development.  If you would like any further information, or have any other questions, please feel free to drop us a line at our Support page.   

If you are having difficulty downloading Unity from our link in Facebook, please visit the Unity web player download page here.

BIG News, everybody!  Luminary is now available to play on Facebook.  We’ve been working long and hard to fix all of the little bugs and kinks, in order to make Luminary as fun and challenging as possible, and are extremely excited to make this announcement.   

Upon logging into the Facebook application, you will be able to immediately play a full game of four mini-games, one in each category; after playing this full game five times, you will automatically unlock another set of four mini-games.  Eight additional games, in two packs of four, are available to purchase at $1 per pack.  So, without spending a penny, eight different games are available to play, and for only $2, you will be able to unlock all sixteen games. 

Additionally, if you decide to register an account with the game (you just need a username, email address, and password; none of your information will be shared with third parties), your scores will automatically be saved in our rankings system where they will be compared with your Facebook friends, as well as the larger Luminary world.  Think you have what it takes to become part of the “5%?”  Register today to find out.  It’s free to start, and registration is extremely easy. 

Soon you’ll be able to take Luminary with you wherever you go, as an iOS version will be available in the near future.

Luminary, the first offering from new start-up Big Idea Games (BIG), provides a welcome spin on the classic brain-training genre.  While retaining the core features that make classic brain trainers so engrossing and challenging, the developers at BIG have added a fresh social element that has been sorely lacking in so many of their stolid predecessors.  From the opening screen, one gets the sense that Luminary is different.

Players are, of course, first greeted with the option to simply play the game, but beyond that, they are able to view their scores and ranking, send messages and virtual gifts, invite and challenge friends, create a fully customizable avatar, and view their hard-earned awards and recognitions.  The innovative ranking system implemented by Luminary allows players to compare their scores not only with their online social circles, but also against everyone in their gender (I sense a new Battle of the Sexes brewing), as well as the world as a whole. 

Don’t let the social features lure you into a false sense of security, though.  Luminary packs a hefty intellectual challenge.  16 mini-games are divided into 4 categories:  Memory, Numbers, Visual, and Attention.  Each game is unique, and will keep even the most ardent brain gamer busy for hours.  Each full game consists of one mini-game in each of the 4 categories, and will consume less than 5 minutes of a player's day.  Even here, Luminary has created more nuance and choice than any other game of its kind.  Players can let Luminary choose a randomly chosen full game, or design their own.   One category proving a bigger challenge than the others?  As even a further option, Luminary allows players to hone their skills by playing all of the games in that category, a perfect way to balance your overall score, and climb to the top of the leaderboards.  

Come back often, as we will be taking a closer look at many of Luminary's features in the weeks leading up to its release, including:  a closer, in-depth look at Luminary's innovative social offerings; a break-down of each of the categories, and an examination of each of the mini-games within each category; and, a look ahead at future releases from Big Idea Games.