Kalimat Remixes The Word Tile Game Genre On Your iPhone

Kalimat presents the user with gorgeous, Retina-ready graphics and interface. The main screen will be split into two panes - a "My Moves" panel on the left and other app options on the right. In "My Moves," you'll see a list of games that are waiting for you.

Those that are familiar with Words with Friends will have no trouble with the Normal mode of gameplay in Kalimat. However, you don't necessarily get Kalimat for the Normal gameplay - rather, you get Kalimat for the Remix mode.

What is Remix? It's pretty much Normal, but with some rule changes, and it's these changes that will keep you coming back. There is a Turn Timer, Letter Swap, and Bonuses.

The Turn Timer will start counting down at the start of each turn - if you play a word in the first minute, your score is tripled. If you play in the second minute, your word score is doubled. After that, there will be no bonus.

Letter Swap allows each player to swap letters once per turn without skipping the turn. However, any more subsequent letter swaps will result in a lost turn. The Bonus points are the same as Normal gameplay (2L, 2W, 3L, 3W), however, there will be a bonus called Ali Baba. This is randomly placed (hidden) on the board in every Remix game, and is worth 50 points.

Those are the rules for Remix games. Sound intrigued? It certainly is a welcome twist to what you've come to expect from tile-based word games. With both Normal and Remix, there will be a Word List that shows what word each player played and for how many points. If a word is selected, a definition will be displayed. Shake-to-Shuffle helps you if you're stuck with your current hand of tiles.

Kalimat is focused entirely on multiplayer, with the Lite version allowing 3 simultaneous games compared with 20 in the full version. There is OpenFeint and Game Center integration, so you can start up games with your friends on either gaming network, or you can even invite others to play via SMS or email. You can also send a message out on Twitter or Facebook to invite your friends to play.

A built-in Chat feature is in every game so you can talk smack to your opponent or just have some friendly chit chat. Push notifications will be sent to you to inform you that it's your turn in a game, or when a new game is created or ending. Thanks to multitasking in iOS 4.0, you can come back to the game right where you left off.

If you want to play with a friend in person that doesn't have an iPhone, there is a Pass & Play mode as well. While it may not be as great as online multiplayer for word games, it works.

For those that are playing many games, you can keep track of them all in the Games tab from the main screen. You can view Current games and Completed games. If it's your turn, it's highlighted in green, if it's their turn, it's highlighted in orange.

Kalimat also features leader boards from the OpenFeint community, where you can view Global, National, and Friends leader boards for Normal or Remix. Additionally, you can view Achievements and Challenges, and even manage your profile.

There's a feature called "AppBoy" that allows you to "check-in" with your apps for a "deeper experience." However, I haven't used this because it's not necessary to the Kalimat gameplay experience. However, I found it to be a bit irritating when it would seemingly pop up occasionally as I was navigating through the option menus.

Sometimes the animations in the app would be a bit choppy and slow. Not sure why this happens, but it would be nice to see the speed and performance improved in future updates.

I found Kalimat to be a very fun and pleasant experience. I especially love the smooth graphics, despite the AppBoy and animation quips. If you tire of Words with Friends, give Kalimat a try - the Remix mode will keep you coming back for more.