Show HN: Truncate, a word-based strategy game

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Overall Reception

  • Many find the game original and compelling (“Scrabble meets Risk”), with several reporting getting “hooked” after a few games.
  • Others bounce off quickly, describing it as “insanely hard”, “more frustrating than fun”, or losing interest due to ergonomics and rule complexity.
  • Several think it has “huge potential” and could even work as a physical board game.

Rules, Complexity & Tutorial

  • Battle rules (valid/invalid words, “weakest link” losing whole attacks, defender +2 advantage, towns counting as one-letter words) are widely seen as non-intuitive and hard to predict.
  • Multiple commenters want:
    • A concise rules page instead of only an interactive tutorial.
    • Attack-result previews or at least “you’re going to lose this battle” warnings.
    • Clearer battle logs that explicitly list which rules and word lengths decided the outcome.
  • Others push back, arguing previews should be limited to an optional “tutor mode” so experienced play still rewards rule mastery and tactical blunders.
  • Some suggest more interactive, puzzle-like tutorial segments and an “advanced” tutorial for special cases.

Dictionary Quality & Visibility

  • Dictionary is a major pain point:
    • Missing expected words/plurals and some British spellings.
    • Accepting obscure or slangy 2–3 letter words.
    • Perceived US-English bias.
  • Many want:
    • On-board highlighting of valid vs invalid words.
    • Easier dictionary access: hotkeys, ESC-to-close, auto-focus search, not covering the board, or persistent side panel.
    • Optional auto-check of newly formed words.
  • The authors describe using an intersection of Wordnik’s games list and SCOWL, plus Wiktionary for definitions, and are open to curation, reporting, and expansion.

UI / UX Feedback

  • Requests include:
    • Board rotation for easier reading, especially of opponent’s words.
    • Better animations for tile draws and battles.
    • Undo support and preventing no-op swaps (e.g., swapping identical letters).
    • Cleaner resign dialog wording.
    • Tile organization, keyboard shortcuts, and right-click word lookups.
  • Some find the puzzle boards too cramped; others like the constrained mid-board slog as part of the strategy.

Platform & Miscellaneous

  • Game is fully open source; license being set to MIT.
  • iOS Lockdown Mode breaks it due to WebAssembly; native app is being considered.
  • Multiplayer exists via room codes; players request matchmaking and discovery.
  • Interest expressed in non-English dictionaries and physical/DIY tile-play variants.