Our first project, Beesly's Buzzwords, is nearing completition. We entered this into the IGF, as well, and it also has a companion web version (http://www.flashbangstudios.biz/buzzwords/) to upsell the full game's download.

Here are some random screens:

http://www.flashbangstudios.biz/tests/bwbeta/beta1.jpg
http://www.flashbangstudios.biz/tests/bwbeta/beta2.jpg
http://www.flashbangstudios.biz/tests/bwbeta/beta3.jpg
http://www.flashbangstudios.biz/tests/bwbeta/beta4.jpg

We have a beta version posted for semi-public use. If you do play it, please post any feedback (and particularly any bugs or usability issues). The beta version does do a simple web check before starting. This is just so we can disable it; it doesn't send any info along with the check. If you're behind an outbound firewall or need a proxy, the check will probably fail for you regardless.

Here's the beta download (6.40MB):
http://www.flashbangstudios.biz/tests/bwbeta/setup.exe

On my machine, the sound stutters between the year summary screen and starting the next season.

I don't really like the grades. First off, the way it's put on there it looks like it was written in blood after a grisly murder. Second, the A-F grading system isn't used throughout the world. Third, the grade doesn't correspond to anything. You still get promoted regardless of your grade.

The wax icon is a good indicator of your progress throughout the level. I like that your word in progress will turn red if that's enough to fill the pot, but it took me a while to figure out that significance. I think I'd still like to see on the pot the point total required, and the season total.

In classic mode, I thought the game was too easy. I do play a lot of word games, for me the first five years or so were solvable just by finding a couple of five letter words. Winter, year 13, 339090.

After letting the game sit for a while, some of the hexes start turning different shades. Um... that freakied me out... It took me even longer to figure out that was a clue. Very subtle.

The font on the hire score table is a little too realistic. Perhaps a bee with better penmanship could write on the board? Also the scores on the bottom right tend to overwrite the tacks.

The boards in challenge mode were also pretty easy. It'd be nice to be able to jump to the higher difficutly levels.

Action mode isn't that action filled, and it sort of makes the game easier. Because you only get one new row of combs per season in classic mode, the pressure is on to locate longer words to fill up the honey pot. But with action mode you can make three letter words until your fingers fall off, because there's a constant new supply of them. Also, it would be nice if the new hexes dropped from the top rather than just appear in place. It's very generous that the board will fill up completely before the game ends. If you let them drop, it adds more of a random factor to it.

Have you considered instead of having all letters fall having some letters replaced instead? Perhaps certain combs are old, and they go away, but newer hexes just age and get a different letter. Just a thought.

I was messing around with some keys, looking for a cheat to skip through levels. I tried CTRL-END (which is the cheat key in my game), but that made the game spontaneously quit to the desktop. :)

Overall it's a nice word game. The word selection mechanism is easy, and submitting with a double click is simple. The hints explain most of the rules as you need them. My largest concern is with the low difficulty factor.

You could have named the installer something other than "setup.exe" :-p

Here the game opens a window filled with black, with "beesly's buzzwords" in the top left corner, a cross in the top right corner, and crashes.

athlon 850, 480MB ram, savage 4 (32MB), Windows 98 SE, directx8.1.