War of Words is a word construction game with role-playing elements. The plot is told in text windows and follows the usual “young lad goes into the world to protect everyone” routine.
The core is split-screen combat against the AI or another player. The playfield of each participant is slowly (or, when pressing a button, faster) filled with letters from beyond. The goal is to create words which then causes the used letters to disappear and the score meter to rise. How much it rises depends on word length and the rarity of the letters, e.g. a Q is worth much more than an E. When the meter is filled, the character attacks the opponent and inflicts damage. Major damage is also inflicted if the letters rise to the top of the screen. The match ends when one player has no health points left. There are also two additional tactical aspects during a match: casting offensive (e.g. a number of rare letters appear on the enemy’s playfield) or defensive (e.g. destroying the largest row on the own playfield) spells or using a five-second shield to protect from enemy attacks. Both require a depletable resource to use: magic points (are restored over time) for spells and shield points (earned by building complex words) for shields. Spells also have a cool-down period before they can be used again.
Between matches, the player moves on a world map to reach new locations. These may offer a number of different opportunities: taking a quest (which leads to a standard battle), buying equipment or solve mini-games (either word riddles or making words from a given set of letters). Solving quests and mini-games rewards experience points (level-ups give more spells), gold or equipment which improves the character’s statistics (attack, defense, intelligence for mana regeneration and luck). There are also other items like health and mana potions. While moving between locations, random battles may occur.
