Anagram Genius 9 review

Alright, I admit it.

It's pointless. Well, almost. There are, after all, a few almost justifiable uses for an anagram scrambler - solving cryptic crosswords, maybe. But the real reason for buying Anagram Genius 9 is to rearrange the letters of your friends' names into words and phrases that are by turns witty, satirical and childish beyond belief.

Creating anagrams is hardly a unique claim to fame - hundreds of sites on the Internet there are that can rearrange the letters of any word or phrase you enter. But few of them offer any kind of control over the resulting anagrams, beyond including or excluding specific words. Anagram Genius offers precise control over a whole range of aspects, and has one of the best laid-out sets of controls we've seen for this type of program.

You start on the Input page by typing in the word or phrase to be anagrammed. Then, using a series of check boxes, you can tell the program if the word you've entered is a noun, and whether it's male, female or inanimate. You can then tell it what type of words it can include in its anagram list: Cockney words with dropped aitches, say, or vulgar slang. Results can be in US or UK English, and you can use special custom dictionaries for computers, business, UK politics, and - bizarrely - cricket. You can also specify a flattering, satirical or neutral slant to the word matches.

On the next page, Anagram Genius creates a list of all the words that can be made from the text you've entered. Here, you can specify words that must appear in the finished anagram, and rate others according to preference. If a term doesn't appear in the list - possibly you have an esoteric taste in swear words - you can add it to Anagram Genius's dictionary for future use. Press the Search button to move to the program's next page, and you'll see a complete list of anagrams, illustrated at the top by a nice animated demonstration of the letters being rearranged.

The list of anagrams chosen is impressive, too - and the program uses a certain amount of intelligence in its choices, throwing in a dash of topical humour. 'Tony Blair', for instance, becomes 'Not by Rail'. 'George Bush' yields 'He Bugs Gore'.

Obviously, £25 is a fair amount to pay for a cheap gag. But if a cheap gag is what you need, you won't get better. Recommended.