There has been a deluge of Yahtzee clones made available on the Windows Mobile platform over the past few months and TripYzee is the latest of these. Available for free, it's a fun version of the popular dice scoring game, with a multiplayer hotseat mode and various skins that can be downloaded to provide customisation.
The basics of Yahtzee are simple - you're given 11 ways of scoring (Three of a Kind, High Straight, etc) and must meet the requirements of each scoring category with three throws in each. The rules allow dice that meet the requirements for the category you're scoring for to be removed from subsequent throws - for instance if you were trying to throw a 5s, and got three 5s on your first throw, you could remove these three dice and try two more times to throw 5s with the remainder.
Installation and Requirements
TripYzee requires at least Windows Pocket PC 2002, and is tested here on Windows Mobile 6.1, so there shouldn't be any serious issues in successfully running the game. Pocket 2002 and 2003 users will require Microsoft .NET Compact Framework 1 installing first.
Available via FreewarePocketPC.net, the 249 KB TripYzee file can be downloaded in a matter of minutes. The downloaded CAB file should be then copied to your Windows Phone and run in order to complete installation.
Playing TripYzee
TripYzee is good fun - although as with other Yahtzee clones for Windows Mobile the interface appears to be rather rigidly based on the tabletop game. Due to this, the game pretty much demands that a stylus is used in order to select which category you're scoring for. This does make the game feel both archaic and formulaic - all of the Yahtzee clones seem to play this way, and a finger-friendly version is definitely required for Windows Mobile.
In hotseat multiplayer mode, the game comes into its own, with all the fun of the table top dice, cup and scorepad game evoked in entertaining fashion.
This is a much lighter and fun interpretation of the Yahtzee game for Windows Mobile than some of the others that have been reviewed over the last few months. It seems to run without performance issues (stuttering on the throws, which appear to be more attuned to the idea of "random" here than in other games) although it does have an odd screen refresh.
Of course, TripYzee is free - while it isn't quite professional quality it is nevertheless a well presented Windows Phone game that can quite easily eat away at a few long journeys.
