Thanks so much, Wonchop!

That’s right — it’s happening, friends!  Can you feel the Joy?!

Don’t forget to Like the official Peggle Fan Page on Facebook for news, updates and tantalizing teases of all kinds!

Wall-nut

Wall-nut

Wall-nut!

And I’ve had the nickname “Patch” ever since.

That same friend later stumped me with REINSTAL. Even my spell check is stumped by that one, actually, but the game accepted it, and my dictionary assures me that it is a valid secondary spelling of reinstall. (I don’t approve of that nutso secondary spelling, incidentally, but then, I’ve never gotten over the fact that you no longer have to double the ending consonant when you change the tense on a verb. You kids today with your crazy grammatical style… I’ll be over here on my rocker, kickin’ it old school with the UK and Canada.)

But being here on the receiving end of player feedback adds a whole new dimension to the game for me, because I not only get to learn the new words that my friends know, I get to learn the incredibly bizarre words that complete strangers know as well. This happens mostly in the context of “missing words” reports.

Since Bookworm Heroes came out a couple of months ago, we have received a handful of screenshots of words that were not accepted by the game, and I have looked up each word I didn’t recognize. (It’s the easiest “bug repro” in history — type the word into a dictionary search engine.)

Here are some of the words I learned lately from player reports:

Yottabyte.  It sounds like a fast food cyber cafe to me, but it turns out this is totally a word. I don’t see it coming up in conversation a lot, but hey, neither does vitiate.

Prolamin.  Some kind of protein my gluten-free friends are missing out on.

Reclusory.  Now, looking at that word, I instantly understood what it would be, and, well duh — it’s a place where you’d find a recluse. Still, it was new to me.

(Point of interest: spell check doesn’t recognize any of these words.  Yet they are in the dictionary. This is what vexes people about the English language, isn’t it? Well, that and the whole “eye before ee except after cee” business.)

And then there are the “missing words” reports we get about words that aren’t technically missing… they’re omitted.

Some of these are a matter of standard word game rules.  Proper nouns are typically not playable words. The rule of thumb is simple: would you capitalize the first letter? Then don’t try to play it.  Seattle, for instance, is a proper noun and therefore not a word.

Then there’s another category of omitted words, and this is the grey area that some players find capricious. But hey, it’s a family-friendly game, and parents like to use it as a teaching tool, and we couldn’t be prouder of that.  So… there are some words that we disallowed in the game. If a word has a totally legitimate primary definition… but also a very commonly known offensive slang meaning, for instance, it’s probably not in the game. If a word is theoretically innocuous, but you can easily imagine a parent not wanting to have to explain it to a young child, we may have left it out.

So, by all means, keep letting us know when you find missing words in Bookworm Heroes! While you could play solo word games and just run through your own vocabulary ad nauseam, competitive word games make for endless learning as you literally get to see a set of letters through someone else’s eyes. And hearing from you helps us fill in gaps in our own lexicon… or Lexicon, if you will.

Take a look at all of the cards below and click on each link or image to download and print.

Mother’s Day cards for Bejeweled Blitz and Bejeweled.

Mother’s Day cards for Plants vs. Zombies and Solitaire Blitz.

Mother’s Day cards for Zuma Blitz and PopCap.

Folding instructions: fold in half, then fold in half again. Don’t forget to sign it!

Back-to-Back Bananas II: Bananas are Back!
In this sequel to the most popular fruit game ever, it’s up to you to place those wacky yellow animated ‘nanas together. But watch out: Harpo’s here again, too, and this time he has a giant tuba in his jacket!

Misreading the Classics
Can you spot the misquoted classic quote before the cudgel of Chaucer or the shillelagh of Sartre crushes your new pen-and-ink set?

Dungeon Ducks
Let the battle of the bills begin! It’s Mallards vs. Mergansers in a strategic mythological melee.

Badger Sack
So, so many badgers. And only one sack.

My First Moustache
Navigate your 14-year-old hero through a maze of Chevron, Dali, Pencil, Freestyle, Toothbrush, Fu Manchu, Handlebar, Horseshoe, Imperial, and more moustaches.

Handroid
Thanks to the magic of Spacestar Ordering, you’ve found yourself with what you most wanted: a robot hand.

Similarly Invisible
Join the quest! Put together the clues as you try to find your match in this social-mobile sensation where nothing is on screen and there are no clues!

Pompous Ringleader
It’s a circus of the narcissistic stars in this struggle of the un-humble. Who will end up with the magic elephant? Only those who play in a most smarmy manner.

Shiny Jackhammer
Whack-a-mole meets Mrs. Doubtfire in this battle to rout the rodents without ever getting dust on your hammer.

Granageddon
It’s a demon in a wig, and it’s after your neighborhood with a bunch of blue-haired fiends in tow. You’ll have to enter the crunch without losing your knitting needles in this action-strategy hit for all ages from 6 to 86.

Naïve Garbage Man
Match the rubbish with the proper bin or your screen starts to smell (warning: experimental technology involved).

Ben-Hurricane
It’s a tic-tac-toe triumph with twisters versus Centurions and every space strategically important. But some, honestly, more important than others.

Dr. Kuhulu and the Mystic Mystery of Madness Manor: An Unexpected Journey to the Land that Time Forgot
Can you travel the back roads to unravel the cryptic clues in time to get away from the tyrannosaurus before the manor crumbles under the ancient gypsy curse?

The Secrets of Smith
The game that made the Internet cry. Tears of sweet, sweet joy. Then some of sadness. Then a few more of joy.

Teefies Go Ouch!
The evil Dr. D.K. (who calls himself a “Dr.” though he only has a Master’s degree) is out to spray his cavity ray at every pearly white in sight. Only you can smear enough chocolate on to save the day in this backwards world.

Sainted Showdown IV
Nicholas the Mystic vs. James the Lesser: Pick your saint. Pick your weapon. The robe-off is on again!

Quelle Surprise Suppertime
Play the edible game that inspired the hit song: “What’s under that plate cover, today, what’s under that plate cover, today, it could be chick-en mole, it could be a potato croquet, it could be a chocolate parfait, what’s under that plate cover, today.”

Dictatortots IV: Pommes Presidenté
The game of potato conquest that’s won six “Spuddies” already is back with a European campaign that’s sure to butter your brains.

Deathray of Sunshine
It’s race day at the Deathray track, and the competition is on with six other sunshine vehicles for the Cup of Doom – but be sure you make it to the finish line without falling into any rain traps.

Scrapple Deluxe
May include possum.

Don’t Offend Australia
The international*** game of dart diplomacy pits your throwing prowess against all comers.

Indifferent Penguin
What can you do to make that wobbly penguin care enough about you to smile? I’d start by blasting away the mean ol’ ice monsters with your hot chocolate ray and then double dose them with your marshmallow mallets. But that’s just me.

*As Curtis once said, “Please don’t steal. Or, if you do, steal well.”

**Hey, these aren’t real games. But if you want to pretend they are, and talk about them to your friends on FriendFace, or whatever social thing you do, well, okay. We dig you.

***Only available in English.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!

And this in fact would accurately describe my state of mind, as we get close to being a mere seven days away from PAX East in Boston. This is because, as is always the case with conventions, there are a million loose ends still, and, at this point, it doesn’t seem like any of them are actually going to get done. You know that feeling you get when you have a paper due, and you haven’t done the reading yet, and it’s due tomorrow, and there’s no way you could possibly finish it, and you think you’re going to flunk out and have to get a job at Arby’s? Yeah, that’s kind of my day today. I’ll give you a real world example:  Yesterday, we found out that the contractor building our booth had fallen sick and would not be able to complete the booth in time. So, with nine days to go, we still didn’t have a booth built and had no one to construct it. Oh yeah, and our swag was missing.

Granted that in the grand scheme of the universe, these are not big problems. I am aware of where this falls on the scale of things to complain about, compared to say, a famine.  Still, somebody has to be responsible for the PopCap booth at PAX East, and that someone is me. So I’m complaining. Wheeee!

Oh yeah, so we have a booth at PAX East. If’n you don’t know what that is, it’s the Penny Arcade Expo, a humongous gaming convention being held in Boston March 22-24. If that sounds cool to you, you’re right, because it is. But if you don’t have tickets already, forget it, because it sold out long ago. PopCap will be there, in what is actually our first-ever appearance on the main show floor. (Previously we have relegated ourselves to the lobby or hallways or sidewalks outside.) Which accounts for the extra panic.

Our plans of what we were going to do at PAX, and what we were going to show, have varied from week to week, if not day to day. And I’m not sure I’m entirely clear on it, still. However, what I can tell you is that — because we found it on a loading dock — we are indeed going to have fantabulous free swag to hand out, as usual. So if you are lucky enough to be going, stop by Booth 974,  say hi, and grab a cool, entirely free, one-of-a-kind PopCap goodie, and rejoice! And don’t go putting it on Craigslist or eBay afterwards, because that just makes us sad.

PAX East is one week away!  Yay! (?)

Hope to see you there!
–Jeff