Upwards Deluxe is a grid based word game that rewards you for exercising your NOGGIN (+12 points). Much like its cousin Scrabble, Upwards features the ability to build words by stacking letter blocks on top of existing letters. In fact doing so opens up a wider set of words that can be formed off established words to help maximize your score. For example, you may initially spell the world ?rain? and later change it by adding a ?g? over the ?r? to spell ?gain?. Or perhaps you have the world ?rolls? placed on the board and you keep the ?r? but build over the ?oll? with ?adi? and add the letter ?h? to form ?radish?. It?s combinations like these that will cause you to take your time and find that extra point maximizing way to combine letters to spell new words. Like Scrabble you begin with 7 letters and words can be built vertically or horizontally, but they must be built off of one another. The game concludes when everybody passes on their turn or you run out of tiled letters.

Upwards features two modes of play - Solitaire or Versus Computer. In the first mode you?ll play by yourself to build words and points. In the later you?ll play against a computer controlled player who will compete with you in points by taking turns. It?s here that the game becomes very challenging especially with its various difficulty settings.

At its core, Upwards Deluxe is a solid word game! It does feature some bells and whistles like the shuffle feature which reorganizes your letters or the world filter feature which will ban the use of words that could be interpreted as offensive by their definitions. The feature that really compliments the game best is its Encarta? dictionary which helps bring meaning to words played in a previous turns adding to your vocabulary. This is particularly useful when the computer forms unfamiliar words on the more challenging difficulty setting. If all else fails, the easy to use Hint button is one click away to help you think of a word or find uses with your current letters.

If you?re looking for a game that?s easy to pick up and play when you have just a few minutes or something to enjoy for an evening, Upwards Deluxe has you COVERED (+14points)