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Knowing I’d have a few hours to waste on a recent cross-country flight, I grabbed a couple of games from the Android Market to use on my phone. One developer in particular, JiuzhangTech Ltd, caught my eye.
Though none of its casual games are necessarily original, JiuzhangTech brings them to Android in a clean, classy way. Among the titles I’ve played so far are WordSearch Unlimited, Super Flood, WordTwist, and Hangman Classic. I’ll tell you more about the first two games here, but I’m confident that all will be on my phone for quite some time.
WordSearch Unlimited is a traditional word-find puzzle with categories like Food & Drink, Body Parts, and Sports. Games are timed and scores are ranked based on difficulty. What’s more, players get a great degree of customization. Aside from choosing the level of difficulty, you can pick from a handful of themes such as Note Paper, Blackboard, and Blue Sky. For a slight twist, I suggest changing to lowercase letters; it offers quite a different experience than the standard uppercase word search.
JiuzhangTech
Super Flood is an addictive game in which users have to fill the entire board with one color in as few moves as possible. Tiles are randomly given one of six colors and it’s up to you to change them using the controls. Aside from small and medium board sizes, you can opt for triangle and hexagon grids instead of traditional squares.
All four of the JiuzhangTech titles I’ve played are ad-supported, but it’s done in a subtle, tasteful manner. An occasional banner change is all that one sees between rounds or at the main menu. Based on the graphics, gameplay, and overall quality, I’d be willing to drop a couple of dollars on each of these. Other games available from the same developer include Super Mine Sweeper, Tic Tac Toe, and Traffic Jam.
