New game Word Medley from Knox College professor, graduate

Sometimes, a dream needs a little technical help to become a reality.

Peter Schwartzman and Brij Patel are the brains behind Word Medley, a new online word game. Schwartzman has been playing competitive Scrabble for over 30 years and has written seven self-published word works under the authorship of Dr. Earth. He is the mayor of Galesburg and Professor of Environmental Studies at Knox College. Patel recently graduated from Knox College, where he earned his bachelor's degree in Computer Science. He is currently pursuing a Master of Science in Computer Science at Illinois State University, working toward a career in the software and IT industry.

In 2020, at the height of COVID-19, Schwartzman woke up from a dream about a word game. The game in his dream was challenging, fun, could be played alone or with other players and was a learning tool. He wrote down the details and later got a few friends to play it over the phone. He wrote the code so he could play it on his computer about two years later but lacked the skills to make it a game that others could play simultaneously online. He found Patel, a recent Knox College alum who majored in Computer Science and after a year of fine tuning, Word Medley went online.

Word Medley asks players to construct words using random letters plus a blank, which can be any letter. If the three letters were A, M and  Z, a player could make MAZE and MAZY. Players take turns finding such words until all are found. Word Medley features multiple rounds, with each round adding a new letter to the letter "field," challenging players to find words of length one-letter longer than the previous round. Rounds typically go from 4-letter words to 8-letter words but players can decide their own starting and finishing length.

"If 'Ice', i-c-e were the three letters, you can make the word 'iced.' You can make the word 'dice.' You can make the word 'nice,'" Schwartzman said.

Players can choose from two lexica ("dictionaries") included in Word Medley; WOW (one of two North American English dictionaries, minus the slurs) and CSW24 (known as the "International English" lexica and the one used in International Scrabble tournaments throughout the world). Games can be rated or casual and special features like "TIPS" and "NIL" add variety to games. All features in Word Medley are currently free and the founders will roll out new special features, like 9-letter words, for contributors to the site.

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