Word Drift, a fun sliding-tile puzzle for Android

Noyes Chapman is the inventor of the 15-puzzle, a sliding-tile puzzle that created a craze as early as 1880. Actually it’s not just “A” sliding-tile puzzle, it’s the first one to have been created. More than 130 years passed since then and that craze for these types of puzzles still lingers. I remember that about 20 years ago I received a sliding-tile puzzle myself, it was a simple one (3×3 I think) but to this day I still remember I played it until one of the tiles got out of its place and that was the end of it.

Word Drift Puzzle is a modern-day sliding tile puzzle game for Android where aside the classical sliding letter action you also get letter-bombs and fixed tiles, combos for multiple word guesses and various challenging tasks, as you can see presented below:

The gameplay is quite simple but the puzzles can be very difficult. Here’s an overview of the game’s rules and play actions:

When the game starts, you have to choose one of the available puzzle categories. Right now there are 4 categories, each with about 20 puzzles: “This and that”, “Internet Meme”, “Pop Culture” and “Geek Art”. There’s also a fifth category in the works, showing as upcoming for now.
After a category is chosen, you see your goal, which is to create words in your puzzle that match a set of given letters. For instance you’ll see at the beginning the letters “a, e, i, o, b”, and this means that in your puzzle, before the time expires, you’ll have to create words that contain at least once the letters mentioned in your goal. This doesn’t mean you can’t create other words, you can create any words you like but it’s important to include those letters to go to the next level, otherwise when the time runs out game ends.
After you see the goal the actual game starts on a 6×6 board. It’s so easy to move the letters that even a child would be able to do it. You basically just put your finger on a letter and slide it to an open position. Whenever you see a word formed, you just put your finger on the first letter and slide it along the other letters – the game will automatically detect if the word is valid an BHAM, the letters will be replaced by others.
In every puzzle aside the regular sliding letters there are fixed tiles. You can’t move those, the only solution is to destroy them. You can destroy these by other forming a word using them, or by making use of the exploding tiles. You’ll notice those exploding tiles as they have a glow around them and show up only after you create an word. There are 3 types of such bombs, marked with a different color, each having a different “blast radius”
At the end of the level you get bonuses depending on how fast you achieved your goal, but also if you managed to collect other items by playing (there are some “notes” icons you’ll see under some tiles, if you get 3 of those you get a bonus)

Don’t get me wrong, the game rules are very easy to understand and you can play it from the first second you open the game. But some of the puzzles are extremely difficult which makes this game very challenging. The suggestion is to start with the first category, the “This and That” one, as it seems to be the simplest of all categories, but if you feel you’re the word guru go ahead and test your dictionary in the other categories as well.

Word Drift has a nice music soundtrack and sounds will guide your way around the game, no additional options included because you don’t actually need them. Here’s some of its main features:

It’s simple to play and free
Has over 80 puzzles, enough to spend long hours playing it
Nice graphics and good music to accompany you in your quests
Exploding tiles and bonuses for combos make the game more fun

If that tile sliding game I mentioned from my childhood triggers any memories from your side as well then you definitely have to try Word Drift, I swear I could just feel the plastic of the tiles as I tapped on my phone to slide it, although it was just my memory of the game I used to play.