InkLink is a Shockwave game on (where else) www.shockwave.com.

It's a game very much like pictionary, where one person draws something and the others see it and guess what it is. You can join rooms with four different difficulty levels (beginner, intermediate, expert, and mixed bag) with up to eight players. You can play as a member or as an unregistered guest. However, only members get the ability to 'boot' a player. The game lasts ten rounds.

When you log on to play the game, you first see a series of lists of rooms you can enter. At the top there are tabs you can click to change your difficulty level. Along the left side there are categories of games -- All Players, Members Only, User-Created. Along the right side is a list of open rooms, usually with names like "The Badger Hut" and "Shockwavers". There are also buttons where you can locate a player and start your own room. The player location ability is useful if you have a friend playing and want to join the room they are in.

When you join a room, you will see a drawing pad in the center of the window where the draw-er will be making his picture. Users' names will be distributed around eight slots, four on either side of the drawing pad. At the bottom there is a text input field where you can type in your guesses as to what the picture is. You can also communicate with the other players -- all can see everything you enter there.

When it is your turn to draw, you will see a row of colored pens across the top of the drawing pad, and a word will be displayed in bold in the bottom corner of the pad. This is the word you have to draw. The default color you start with is black, but you can change colors by clicking on the pen that has the color you want to use. If the word is too difficult, you can pass to the next player. If you do this, the word will be displayed to all of the players and the next person will go with a different word, but it will be the same round. Some people, especially in the beginner rooms, will spell out a word with the drawing pad if they don't know how to draw it. This is considered very bad form. Some people, when spelling, make it slightly more challenging by spelling out a mirror image of the word, or spelling it backwards. This is also not thought highly of, especially if you're in a members-only room or in a more difficult level.

Besides drawing and guessing, you can also privately message the other users in your room. If others in your room are being irritating (say, by messaging you repeatedly with 'asl?'), you can choose to ignore them. And, if they're cheating, being abusive, or generally being a royal asshat, you can boot them.

As I mentioned before, you can only boot players if you are a member and signed in. To boot them, you select their name, click boot, and choose a reason why you want to boot them: a cheating player, an abusive player, or you just don't want to play with them. A little boot will appear next to their name. If you can get four other players (the majority of the eight-player room) to do this, they will be removed from the game. Usually if you have a full room and enough members playing, it's not difficult. However, if you're in a room full of guests, you really can't get rid of an abusive player. This is why I suggest registering with Shockwave if you play this -- they don't send you annoying emails, and you get to blam others. Also, you get to pick your own name, instead of being "Guest45732".

Personally, I heavily recommend this game. It's fun, free, and simple, you can play with your friends or alone, it can teach you new words, and it's a good way to waste time.

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