Word Game Worth?

Marty wants to play a word game with friends. He writes down a few words and tells them how much they are worth points.

MATH - 1 point
TREE - 1 point
HAND - 2 points
BOMB - 5 points
WING - 0 points
FINS - 0 points


He gives them this clue, "Count the fields, get the points."

How many points is WORD GAME worth?

I believe WORD GAME should be worth

4 points

Marty's hint indicates that

the score of a word/phrase comes from the number of enclosed spaces in the letters. For instance, B has two enclosed spaces, O has one, and E has none.

Using this scoring procedure, we can confirm that the scores of the words he provides are correct:

(Bold letters indicate one enclosed space; bold and italics indicates two.)

MATH = 1 enclosed space = 1 point
TREE = 1 enclosed space = 1 point
HAND = 2 enclosed spaces = 2 points
B$$\!$$O$$\!$$M$$\!$$B = 5 enclosed spaces = 5 points
WING and FINS = 0 enclosed spaces = 0 points

And the scoring for WORD GAME looks like

WORD GAME = 4 enclosed spaces = 4 points

• Ugh. my internet is slow... +1 – Omega Krypton Nov 22 at 6:09
• @OmegaKrypton It happens to the best of us, don't worry too much :) – HTM Nov 22 at 6:12

WORD GAME is worth

4 points

Explanation:

The score of a word/ phrase is the number of closed shapes in a word. (Hinted by "Count the fields")