S T R A T E G Y   G U I D E

SpellBurst is a word puzzle game played on a 7×11 grid of letter tiles. Spell words, create power tiles, and trigger cascading chain reactions. There's no single right way to play — big words, clever chains, and smart positioning all lead to high scores.

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🔤 Spelling Words

Drag across adjacent tiles or tap them one by one to spell a word. Letters must connect horizontally, vertically, or diagonally. When you submit a valid word, those tiles disappear and new letters drop from the top to fill the gaps.

Each letter has a point value. Rarer letters score dramatically more — Q and Z are worth 10× an ordinary vowel. Longer words earn a length bonus on top of their letter values.

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💥 Power Tiles

When you spell a word of 4 or more letters, the last letter in your word transforms into a power tile based on the word's length:

• Sunburst (4-letter words) — clears a 3×3 area around itself
• Tidal Wave (5-letter words) — clears the entire horizontal row
• Flamestrike (6+ letter words) — clears the entire vertical column

Chain Reactions

Power tiles activate automatically when they hit the bottom row. When tiles above drop down to fill gaps, any power tile that reaches the bottom activates immediately — and its blast can cause more power tiles to fall and activate. One word can set off a chain that transforms the entire board.

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🔥 Streaks

Your streak is shown as four circles on the screen:

Each move where at least one power tile activates fills a circle and raises your multiplier. Each move without one empties a circle. It doesn't reset — it climbs and falls gradually.

At max streak, your words score nearly double. The key is consistency — even a small power activation each move keeps it climbing.

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🏆 Scoring

Word Score

The sum of your letter values, plus the length bonus, multiplied by your current streak multiplier.

Power Score

When power tiles activate, you earn half the letter value of the tiles they clear.

Combo Bonuses

Chain multiple power activations in a single move for massive bonus points. Hit SUPER! at 3 activations, or EPIC! at 5. Bigger words earn bigger combo bonuses.

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⭐ Levels

Each level has a goal and a limited number of moves. Earn 1 to 3 stars based on how many moves you have remaining when you finish. Stars and gold unlock new levels as you progress through the map.

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💡 Tips

1. Invest in the word first. Combo bonuses scale with word quality. A weak 3-letter word triggering SUPER! earns far less than a strong 6-letter word doing the same.
2. Don't break the streak. Even one power activation per move keeps your multiplier climbing. Streak is compound interest.
3. Think vertically. Flamestrikes clearing columns often trigger more cascades than horizontal Tidal Waves, since they're more likely to drop power tiles to the bottom row.
4. Set up the board. Position words so that clearing them drops power tiles into each other. The best combos are the ones you engineer, not the ones you stumble into.
5. Hunt rare letters. Q and Z are worth far more than common tiles. A short word with a rare letter often outscores a longer word without one.