Wow! Free has come a long way in the Apple App Store. Gone are the days where free apps consisted of simple gimmick sound boards and unplayable games. I ran across quite the gem of an app the other day and figured I’d share it with our readers. I typically don’t troll the App Store much so excuse me if I am late to the party with this short review of Words with Friends : Free Edition.
I actually was encouraged by a friend of mine to download the application. Without reading anything on the description page I did so and was pleasantly surprised. You see this was an old friend from back home and we used to play board games all the time, mostly Scrabble.
This was actually a near exact replica of the popular word game. Not only that, but after a quick sign up process using my email, I was able to look her up by her email, and within seconds we were playing “scrabble” together, from completely different states.
Not only do you play the game in near real time, you have the option to chat with your opponent (perfect for in game trash talking so you don’t have to switch from your game to the sms app to say “VORACIOUSNESS bitch! Yeah it’s a real word, 60 points!” Which brings me to my next point that this is certainly not your typical watered down trial version.
My favorite feature had to be the push notifications. They worked like a champ. If I closed the application to do something, and forgot that I was playing, it would beep and remind me that it was my turn, showing the typical push notification icon, on top of the game icon on my springboard.
Overall the game play was enjoyable, only having to wait 30 seconds to a minute between turns if the other player is paying attention, very nice. The interface was very intuitive as it felt like you were playing the board game, not hard to figure out.
The only real set back I ran into was when I tried to download Words with Friends for my iPad. It told me I needed to register the original version on my iPhone before being able to use it on another device. I’m not sure if that meant I needed to purchase the full version or just register my email.
To be honest I didn’t mess with it much as I do plan on purchasing the full version in HD for my iPad if I continue to play it as much as I had been. For not costing me anything, this is a pretty sweet app that has definitely found a place on my home screen, how about you?