Fans of Words With Friends are in for a familiar treat with Scramble With Friends. Both are asynchronous multiplayer games, but where the former is a social variant of Scrabble, here the gameplay is based on Boggle. Asyncho-what? It just means a turn-based game that can be played even when your opponent is not around. And that’s the appeal. You can start a game with friends on iPhone or Facebook, and when they next log in, they are notified that it’s their turn.
The game consists of a four-by-four grid filled with letters. Players use a finger to connect them to words, while racing the clock. Longer words lead to higher scores. There are also power-ups that add variety. You choose one for the price of entry — a token — and for an additional coin, you can add another.
The point of the game, of course, is not just winning, but socializing. Facebook is integrated, and you can tweet or email game requests. The messaging system in the With Friends series has become so popular some people use it in lieu of email.
The game is polished and loads of fun, with one caveat: You start with a generous number of tokens, but they go quickly. Once you run out, you hit a pay-wall. The patient player can wait for (fewer) tokens to be regenerated over time, but if you want to keep going, you’ll have to buy extra tokens, in-app. It’s hardly unexpected, but nonetheless frustrating to the parsimonious wordsmith.
