I'm living out of boxes.  I won't even pretend that I have played this week's Xbox Live Arcade games, Word Puzzle and Switchball.  Today's guest of honor has, though, and he's already snagged 200 out of 200 gamerscore points on Word Puzzle.  This wizard of words, a law student from New York city, scrambled his first name, Bernard, and his last name - which I will kep secret - into his gamertag BWOzar.  Word scrambling is like second nature to him.





Are you a fan of puzzle games in general?
It's not my favorite genre but I have played and enjoyed a number of
puzzle games over XBLA. My grandmother was a big fan of word games and
game shows and passed the interest down to me, so I was pretty excited
for the release of Word Puzzle.

Did you go out of your way to get the achievements, or did they just
unfold through gameplay?
Most of the achievements in Word Puzzle were unlocked by thoroughly
using each mode available in the game.  I must admit, I usually
have a tendency to focus my gaming on achievements.

Do you have any Word Puzzle tips for other players?
In multiplayer always look for the longest words first. You can focus
your eyes on the outside few rows of the word square and focus on
finding the first letter and working from there. In the Survival mode
I thought the greatest challenge came late in the game when you needed
to work with rather large rotating word cubes. I found focusing on
finding one word at a time (the one with the current longest bomb when
my specific search began) was the most effective way to knock out all
the bombs. I found that focusing on finding only one word at a time is
the most efficient way to go through any mode in the game.

What games have been your favorite on the 360 so far?
Without question Oblivion has been my favorite thus far. I've also
really enjoyed Call of Duty 2 and 4, Gears of War, Kameo, Halo 3,
Portal, Geometry Wars, Time Pilot, Word Puzzle and Guitar Hero.

Are there any games you are looking forward to?
I'm most excited for Mass Effect and Fallout 3. I'm also looking
forward to Assassin's Creed, Devil May Cry 4, Rock Band, Undertow,
Halo Wars, Lego Indiana Jones and (am I allowed to say this last one?)
Super Smash Bros. Brawl for Wii.

Are you a member of any websites or online communities?
I'm an active member at achieve360points.com. I've also recently
discovered 360voice.com which is a pretty funny site, it computer
generates a blog from your 360's perspective based on your gaming
activity.