The worldwide sudoku craze appears to be fading — if electronic versions of the number-logic game are any indication. Since 2005, I've seen dozens of sudoku games for consoles, hand-helds, computers and cell phones. On the schedule for 2008 are ... none.

I gave into the fad for a while. But now that I've achieved a reasonable skill level, it feels like there's not much more to see. I've put aside sudoku and returned to my old puzzle regimen.

I'd love to see more video games based on word puzzles. And a handful of publishers are taking chances on new games that appeal to word mavens.

• "WordJong" (Destineer, for the Nintendo DS, $19.99): Like last year's "Puzzle Quest," which deftly combined "Bejeweled" and role-playing, "WordJong" mixes two old favorites: Scrabble and mah-jongg. It isn't as satisfyingly deep as "Puzzle Quest," but makes for a nice 10-minute diversion.

Each screen presents the now-familiar pile of mah-jongg tiles, now decorated with letters instead of symbols. You can use any tiles that are unblocked on the left or right, but instead of matching images, you're forming words. You get bonus points for words that are longer than five letters or use less common letters like Z and X. To complete a puzzle, you need to remove all the tiles — which often means settling for shorter words to balance your remaining letters.

"WordJong" serves up one fresh puzzle every day, or you can take on the "Temple Challenge," a series of increasingly difficult layouts. Three stars out of four.

• "My Word Coach" (Ubisoft, for the Wii, DS, $29.99): The "Coach" series is closer in spirit to Nintendo's "Brain Age" titles. Bearing the imprimatur of a Canadian linguistics professor, it's designed to improve your vocabulary through a series of simple yet amusing exercises.

Some of the games involve spelling. Others involve matching words to their definitions. Your speed and accuracy determines your "expression potential," which suggests a career path. Two stars.

• "Word Puzzle" (Microsoft, for the Xbox 360, $10): The word search is kind of the slack-jawed cousin of the crossword, but this Xbox Live Arcade game livens it up a little by adding time limits and competitive play.

As with the pencil-and-paper version, you're given a list of words and a grid in which the words are hidden, running in all directions. Some of the puzzles give you extra points for finding a theme that matches all the hidden words; you can also score bonuses by matching opposites or finding a series of answers before a timer ticks down.

One-and-a-half stars.