scramble

Most games on my iPhone keep my interest for awhile, but then they enter a state of sitting on my home screen until I remember to revisit them. If they sit long enough, I'll delete them knowing I can always redownload if the urge strikes me. But there is one category of games I never stop playing.

When I get a moment, I'm always catching up with word games on my iPhone. I constantly have a Scrabble (iOS|Android) game going along with both Scramble with Friends (iOS|Android) and Words with Friends (iOS|Android). When I have … Read more

There are several games on both of my iOS devices at any given time from just about every genre. But there are only a few games I go back to on an almost daily basis and that's because they are fun, addictive, and a great way to keep in touch with friends and family.

These "casual" games are turn-based and require you to connect with a friend to start playing -- there is no single-player option with this collection. They have also been around for a while, but that's kind of the point: these are the games I continue to play because it only requires a couple of minutes to take my turn and send it to a friend. While it is sometimes a pain to go in and complete my turns (especially when life gets busy), the overall experience of competing with your friends and family is a good one and acts as a way to stay connected, even in our busy everyday lives.… Read more

As the series' first arcade-style and first non-word game, Gems -- available in Canada with a worldwide rollout to follow in the coming weeks -- features gemstones of different colors and numbers that can be combined to score points.

"They combine and they create these epic combos," said Paul Bettner, vice president and general manager at Zynga. "It's a thrilling game and very, very addictive."

Zynga is introducing this mobile-only game amid criticism of … Read more

Matching with Friends (2.99, full version - Free, ad-supported version) is another in a long line of Zynga apps that let you play turn-based games with a friend on mobile devices. But instead of playing word games loosely based on Hangman, Scrabble, or Boggle, this time you'll be strategically placing matching colored blocks on a gameboard, then sending your move to a friend.

Like other Zynga games, Matching with Friends makes getting connected with your friends easy. Upon launch you'll be asked to sign in through either your Facebook or Twitter account. Once logged in, you can search for other players from your friends list or get automatically matched with a random player.… Read more

We love Facebook pranks as much as the next guys, but not when it's coming from an anonymous source at Best Buy. As if we needed another reason not to step foot in the big blue retailer, we read this story about a Best Buy employee that posted a phony Facebook status update on a customer's phone. The message declared, "I am gay, I'm coming out," but there's one problem: the customer is straight.… Read more

How many points do you usually score in a two-minute round of Scramble With Friends? In certain rounds, with double letters and triple-word bonuses, hundreds of points can quickly add up with each word found.

As with Boggle, the object of Scramble With Friends is to find as many words as you can in a jumbled grid of letters by connecting adjacent letters to form words. A fellow known on YouTube as thedotnetkid grew tired of people accusing him of cheating after he amassed thousands of points in mere minutes.

To silence the critics, he uploaded a video showing how he scored an astounding 2,740 points in the final session of a match against some unfortunate soul. For those fluent with the game, he uses the "freeze time" perk. … Read more

Scramble With Friends (99 cents), a new game from Zynga, has rocketed to the top of the iTunes App Store with classic Boggle-like gameplay so you can challenge your friends.

Gaming company Zynga has enjoyed huge success with hit iOS games including Words with Friends, Hanging with Friends, and Texas hold-'em game Zynga Poker. A new word game from the company took the tried and true classic board game, Boggle, and made it into an iPhone-friendly multiplayer game that's as addictive and fun as the original.

Like Boggle, the object of the game is to find as many … Read more

AlterJig is a simple tile-based jigsaw puzzle game that is much more challenging than it seems at first. Instead of irregular jigsaw pieces, AlterJig uses identical squares that are rotated in groups of four around the points where their corners touch. The puzzle scrambles the inner squares but not the edge squares; the object is to rotate the tiles to complete the picture. The game includes several image puzzles with different levels of difficulty, but you can make your own puzzle from any properly formatted bitmap image. The game includes a basic but clear Help file, but the brief animated … Read more

Word Scramble 2 is a free, ad-supported word-find game in which you quickly search for words formed by adjacent letters on a grid. The simple interface makes good use of the iPhone and iPod Touch touch screen: you trace words with your finger (three letters or longer) on a four-by-four or five-by-five letter grid. Light-up letters and bobbling animation provide nice feedback (especially since you're obscuring the letters you're choosing with your finger), and the game tracks your score, time remaining, and how many words you've found out of the number of possible words. (Although be warned … Read more