Guessword

Guessword is a small word-guessing game written in 1995 by Miguel Frias and posted to Info-Mac as his first Mac game. It plays like a cross between hangman and Mastermind: one person enters a secret word, the other deduces it through repeated guesses with feedback after each attempt. A solo mode lets the computer pick the word.

Gameplay

A hidden word is chosen, either by a second player or by the program itself. The guesser submits candidate words; Guessword reports how close each guess is, in the spirit of Mastermind's peg feedback, and play continues until the word is uncovered.

Solo or Two Player

The two-player mode turns the Mac into a referee for a pass-and-play match, while the solo mode lets the program serve as the puzzle setter so the game is still playable alone.

Origin

Posted to comp.sys.mac.* and the Info-Mac archive in April 1995 by Miguel Frias of the Instituto Superior Tecnico in Lisbon, Portugal.

Requirements

Distributed as a BinHex-encoded archive (guessword-15.hqx) for classic 68k and early PowerPC Macs; decode with BinHex 4.0 before launching.