Slideword

Slideword places five hidden words on a 5×5 grid of mixed letters, with one particularity: the grid wraps around itself. Each row and each column is shifted by one step via the arrows placed on the edges, and the letter that exits one side reappears on the other. You therefore never place a letter, you convey it. The five definitions are shown on the left from the start, each hiding its word under a bar that can be revealed.

1. First read the five numbered definitions in the left column: they are visible before the first move.
2. Click an arrow at the edge of the grid to shift the corresponding row or column by one step; the selected row is highlighted.
3. Play with the wraparound: a row pushed to the right brings its last letter back in from the left, nothing ever falls off the board.
4. Use the padlock placed to the left of each row to freeze a completed row; the game's notes recommend locking early in Easy mode.
5. Reconstruct the five words; the Give up button under the grid ends the game, and a HINTS counter remains displayed above the board.

The idea is clever: the definitions are given, the difficulty is not finding the words but getting them into place. On a wrapping grid, each move that fixes one row disturbs another, and you end up thinking in trajectories rather than letters. The game even embraces its machine side, with its column elevators, its row corridors and its padlocks, a very different kind of dexterity from typing on a keyboard.

No color-coding like some letter games: the tiles remain neutral and it is reading the words that serves as the verdict. The grid does, however, indicate the active row or column by highlighting it and coloring its two arrows, which prevents accidental shifts. Above the board, a HINTS counter stays permanently displayed, and each definition keeps its word hidden under a black bar that you can choose to reveal. The header offers a pause button, and the game's notes mention a stopwatch that pauses when the player steps away.

Daily game

One grid per day, the current date serving as the title in the header, with a selector to change the day.

Difficulty settings

The game's notes detail an Easy mode, where locking a row makes perfect sense, and the page also refers to a hard mode.

• Read the five definitions before touching an arrow: they are free and turn a heap of letters into a simple sorting problem.
• A row only spins on itself: it never reorders its letters. Columns are the ones that swap letters between rows: columns are the elevators, rows the corridors.
• Since the grid wraps, going the opposite way is often the shortest path; the game's guide reminds that a letter is never more than two shifts from its place on its row or column.