Crossword Explorer+

This could easily be a 5 Star game, but due to a lack of word variety it leaves much to be desired. There are times where words like “STY” and “EMO” show up in several puzzles in a row, and that’s just two examples. Because of this, the puzzles get boring quickly. Additionally, the UI feels cheap. You only see the “map” if you back out of the puzzle. Also, other game modes exist, but getting to them is confusing. I feel like a dedicated home page would make this experience much better. Overall, I enjoy playing as a way to kill time, but I don’t often hang around for long because of the issues I mentioned.

Little more to say that other critics have said. This, for years and hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of levels, was so much fun. Now it’s 80% mobile game slop and 20% game that I’m actually here for. It’s like having 40 minutes of ads in a 45 minute movie. I contacted in-game help but I can’t believe it will change anything about the newest direction the game has taken. 5 star down to 1. If you’re reading this as a new or curious potential player, I’d avoid it for the most part unless you enjoy wading through a slew of pop-ups, in-game currency nonsense and “greedy mobile game goofery”.it truly feels like a large out of touch company bought out the original developers and changed the game in almost every way you would be frustrated with.

I like this because the difficulty doesn’t ramp up so quickly that I feel like a moron. I’m not a professional crosswords player. I’m just a dude that likes the occasional fun game on my phone. Edit: December 2025 What happened? My beloved chill out app to slow down and relax with now has popups during each game, and more than one. It’s annoying. At first I thought what the heck I’ll try it, and I got lost in what game I’m even playing. You leave the current board, then the next on and so on. It’s disorienting. Now I just dismiss all that noise so I can get back to relaxing. I don’t want engagement bait. This isn’t TikTok and that’s what I like.