Pencil Games 4+

Lazy

I didn’t experience crashes, but this app seems useless. You could just as easily screenshot a word search or sudoku puzzle and solve it with mark up. With the exception of crossword puzzles, there are no hints or answers so if you get stuck, too bad. And the 2-player games don’t have multiplayer. There is also no customizing your pen or the environment. I know the goal is a paper and pen feel (hence 2 instead of 1 stars), but there’s no point in moving it to an app if there are no other features. Just print out some puzzles and actually do them on paper, the experience will be identical.

Developer Response ,

Thank you for your feedback. It is true that you could print out puzzles and do them on paper for a similar experience. Part of the intent of this app is to recreate the pencil/paper experience without the hassle. You may be on an airplane, or in a hotel room where a printer isn't available. The app generates random puzzles infinitely on demand, so you don't need to go searching for another puzzle every time you'd like to do another one. Two player games are intended to share the same device, and take turns drawing on it as you would on a regular piece of paper. There are many planned features and enhancements for this app, but I apologize for the slow pace of implementation due to limited time constraints. I feel that the description and screenshots give a good indication of the app functionality, but I'm sorry to hear that you were expecting something different. Please feel to reach out to the support link if you have further suggestions or comments.

doesn’t work for what i want

i downloaded this for sudoku, bc i liked being able to just write the numbers in. i haven't gotten a single solvable puzzle yet. i get most of the way in, and then nothing lines up, because the way the puzzles generate make them impossible to solve.

crossword is ok, sometimes frustrating when the definitions are unnecessarily long and confusing, but word search is pretty decent. i haven’t played the 2-player games yet. chances are i’m only keeping this app for that, but the sudoku issue is a huge disappointment, so i’m just gonna keep looking for a different, correctly generated puzzle app.

Poorly implemented

Strange long lines come out of nowhere, so you can’t rest your hand on your iPad as you write with your Apple Pencil. It also doesn’t make any sense that the games aren’t interactive at all. You could just as easily mark up over a screenshot of a crossword puzzle. There’s no interaction with the game that would tell you whether or not you got the answer right or wrong. You are just scribbling on top of a picture of a crossword puzzle. I don’t really get the point of that.