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It’s time for another installment of Palm Discovery’s wReview Wednesday!

It doesn’t matter how many games there may be out there on your iPhone, iPod Touch or other mobile smartphone, some of us tend to want to play a certain “brand” of game regardless of how closely a “clone” or copy cat game out there tries to mimic the original. So, being someone who enjoys playing Scrabble (although I pretty much am so lame at it), I didn’t want to miss the chance to own my very own official Scrabble game on my iPod Touch.

This SCRABBLE game is made by Electronic Arts, the people who brought you all those great PC, Wii, Playstation and other platform games like NHL 10, Madden NFL 11, etc. So, with EA backing this up, you know that it’s good. And, it doesn’t disappoint. If you’re a fan of Scrabble, you will enjoy playing it on your iPhone or iPod Touch as the game play is very much like if you were playing it on the board, the old fashioned way. You can pass, scramble your tiles, exchange tiles and do most of what you do on the actual board game plus a bit more.

This SCRABBLE game on the iPhone and iPod Touch also offers you Facebook Connect, allowing you to play with your Facebook friends, although the game play won’t likely be immediate as you will need to wait for the other player on Facebook to make their move before you can play yours. This is similar to, and in actuality, is what Scrabulous was on Facebook, before the people of Scrabble decided to launch an infringement lawsuit on the game makers, a few years back. One of the appealing thing of Facebook Connect or playing games on Facebook, especially with Scrabulous, or now officially Scrabble, is that you can play a game with your Facebook friends and not be confined or required to having both of you be online and playing the game at the same time. You can make your move and notify the other player that it’s their move and they can make their move and so on. The beauty of this is that no one is hurried into making their move and everyone plays in their own time and place. With the popularity of Scrabulous on Facebook, Scrabble decided that they should get in on it too, and thus, now we have the official game of Scrabble on Facebook. Plus, in addition to playing with your Facebook friends, you can also play a multi-player game via wi-fi with your friends, if you all have your own iPhone or iPod Touch with Scrabble installed. Very cool.

For those of us without friends who have an iPhone or iPod Touch or any Facebook friends, we can still play by ourselves via a solo game, or against the computer. So, there’s no excuse for any Scrabble fan to NOT get this game.

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For those who want to skip over all the detailed review and just want a summary, you can jump to the review summary

The game of Scrabble is very simple. The game is a board of 15 x 15 squares where you are expected to place tiles on them to create words. To start the game, each player grabs 7 tiles on your rack, each tile with a letter from the alphabet or a blank one (wildcard). In the case of the game, it’s handed out to you. The person who first starts the game will have to create a word out of the letters that he has on his rack and place it over the middle of the board, signified as a STAR. The points on each tile will be added and calculated and a tally of the points will be posted at the top right corner. Depending on where the tiles are placed, the player’s tile points may double (Double Word score) or triple (Triple Word Score) or just the tile itself (Double Letter Score, Triple Letter Score). You must place your tiles to “connect” with other tiles already placed on the board and the word you create must be a valid word in the dictionary. The object of the game is to use up all the tiles you have on your rack before everyone else.

Much like the board game, you can shuffle your tiles around (either by tapping on the button or shaking your iPhone) to get a better idea of words to create, exchange your tiles for another set (use up your turn), Pass (don’t use your turn). Plus! This Scrabble game also has an extra (somewhat of a “cheat” feature) called “Best Word” where you can get the computer to come up with a “Best word” that will give you the best points and score from your tiles.

You also have the option of turning the game music, sounds ON or OFF. There’s also a volume slide (I like)

More details of Scrabble for the iPhone and iPod Touch (taken from Apple iTunes store)

Play America’s favorite word game — ANYTIME ANYWHERE! Whether you connect with friends and play up to 25 games at a time, or savor a game solo, wordplay fun is always at your fingertips.

PLAY WITH FRIENDS IN MUTLIPLE WAYS
Challenge friends via Facebook, or square off in Pass N’ Play or Local Network Play. Play up to 4 friends per game! Any way you play it, SCRABBLE spells more F-U-N for everyone!

TALK A GOOD GAME WITH IN-GAME CHAT
Socialize and stay in the game, too! With the in-game chat feature you don’t have to exit to talk with your friends.

LEARN AS YOU GO
The SCRABBLE Teacher Feature lets you see the best word choice from your previous move – so the more you play, the better you get.

LOSS FOR WORDS?
Get a helping hand! Use the in-game word list, built-in official SCRABBLE dictionary, or the EXCLUSIVE best-word feature to see your highest scoring choices.

KEEP THE ACTION GOING WITH QUICK CONTROLS
Shake to shuffle letters. Drag ‘n drop to place tiles. Pinch to zoom and get a better view of the board. Intuitive menus get play going quickly. You can start a classic game with just one click!

ROCK WHILE YOU RACK UP THE WORD SCORES
Listen to and control your iTunes® Library, and get the wordplay party going with friends and family.

Slideshow of Scrabble for the iPhone and iPod Touch

Video of Scrabble for the iPhone and iPod Touch

Video review of Scrabble for the iPhone and iPod Touch

Here are my observations:

I Liked:

Play with your Facebook friends via Facebook Connect

One of the best ideas that ever came with Facebook was playing games online with your Facebook friends. The best thing about playing games with your friends on Facebook is that you play on your own time so that you don’t need to connect online with each other (very difficult when you’re on opposite ends of the world) and you play when you want to without any pressure. When you’ve played your turn, you can pass it on to your opponent and wait for them to make their move.

Of course, if you hate waiting, then playing via Facebook Connect may be very frustrating as it seems like forever before it’s your turn again. This way, you can play several games with different opponents to keep yourself occupied.

Play with friends via Multi-Play connection on wi-fi

If you have friends who also own an iPhone or iPod Touch (who doesn’t nowadays?), you can get everyone together (up to 4 people) to connect together and play multi-player via wi-fi. This makes for interesting game play as it keeps everyone together and you’re playing against each other.

View “moves” list

During your game, you can go back to the Menu (top left corner) and view your “moves” to get a feel of what words you created.

Music and Sound toggle

The game offers you the option of toggling the music and or sound ON of OFF. This is a nice setting as I tend to find that the default game music can get very annoying and repetitive after a while.

Volume slider

I like it when games offer a volume slider so that I can set the music and sound at a level I want, rather than the simple toggle sound ON or OFF.

Play tunes from your library

During your game, you can play tunes and music from your iPod or iPhone Library instead of the game music. I’m sure that many people love this feature and it’s nice to know it’s supported.

“Best Word” feature

For those who are stuck playing a round, the iPhone game offers what’s called a “Best Word”. Simply clicking on this button will have the computer figure out a word that it considers the “best” and puts it on the board along with the points it gets. It is certainly a nice, and somewhat of a “cheat” or “hint” feature, but I do find that the “best word” may not necessarily give you the highest points. It’s still nice to have especially when you’re stuck.

Shake to shuffle tiles supported

One cool feature of this game is that you can shuffle the tiles simply by shaking the iPhone. Once the iPhone recognized that it’s shaken, the tiles will be shuffled to give you a different placement of the same tiles. Or, you can simply click on the Shuffle button and it will do the same thing. Sometimes when you’re stuck, simply shuffling the tiles around will help you think up of a word.

Exchange tiles supported

One of the important parts of the Scrabble game is the ability to exchange tiles and this game offers it. However, by using your turn to exchange tiles, you will not get any points as you have used it to exchange the tiles.

Pass turn supported

Again, Pass the turn is another part of the game that some players prefer to play and this game also offers this feature. And again, by selecting a Pass, you are forgoing the ability to get points as you have opted to pass your turn.

Immediate points tally

Being that the iPhone and iPod Touch is really a small computing device, I really love how the game will practically immediately tally up your points from the board. No more needing to do the calculations yourself and trying to figure out whether the tile was over a Triple or Double Word or Letter Score. The game will calculate it for you and tally up all your points to provide the latest sum at the top right.

Easy zoom in and zoom out feature

As we all know that the board is a 15 x 15 tiles square and our iPhone or iPod Touch is not a square, the developers of the Scrabble game has figured out how to address the problem of viewing the tiles from afar and directly on the board. When you play your turn, the entire board layout with all tiles placed on it is displayed so that you get a general idea of what words are there and where all the TL, DL, TW, DW squares are. Once you drag your tile to the board, the screen will immediately zoom to the area you have placed your tile, so that you can see exactly where you are placing the tile. Ingenious.

Recall supported

You can easily “recall” your placed tiles (provided you didn’t play it yet) back onto your rack by clicking on the Recall button. This saves the time and hassle of individually moving the tiles back.

No time limit

Unlike playing with a friend on the board game, you aren’t bothered by the friend complaining and hurrying you up to make your word. You can take as long as you want and there’s no time or clock running. There’s absolutely no pressure to put your tiles down and thus no stress. Or so, we think.

I Didn’t Like:

Doesn’t support landscape

Yet another app that doesn’t support landscape. I don’t care whether it will look better or worse in landscape. It would be nice to have the option and let me choose whether I prefer it in landscape or portrait.

No time limit

Although I do like not having a time limit on the game, I also think that it could also make it even more challenging if there were a special “practice” game that I can play where there is a time limit and I have to create a word within a certain time. Or, at least have a clock running so that I have an idea how long it takes me to play my tiles.

No Dictionary lookup

Although having a dictionary totally defeats the purpose of playing Scrabble as it is a word knowledge game, it would be nice to have if there were a dictionary lookup of words. However, right now, you can do it “trial and error” and will figure out if a particular word exists.

No FREE or Lite version

One of the most expected nowadays especially with apps and games in my view is a free version or, in the case of iTunes App Store, a “Lite” version where you can try it out and get a feel of the game. Unfortunately, there is no such free version and you’ll just have to take my word for it that it’s a lot of fun. However, at least, you can get a feel of it as I play it on the video review.

Review Summary

SCRABBLE for the iPhone and iPod Touch is a fun, educational game that brings the old-fasioned board game that many of us played when we were kids to the palm of your hand! Play it very much the same way you play the board game with tile shuffles, exchanges, pass turns. Plus! You can play with your Facebook Friends as well via Facebook Connect! Or you can play multi-player with friends who have the game on their iPhone. Any way you play it, you’ll love it. Check out SCRABBLE yourself!

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