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Facebook face-off: Scrabble vs. Scrabulous (Rafe Needleman – July 16, 2008, Webware)

What's a seven-letter word for, "So long, Scrabulous?" [...]

In conjunction with Electronic Arts, that official Hasbro Scrabble app is now up, in beta. How does it compare to Scrabulous? Pretty well. Too well, actually. While Scrabulous fans will see no reason to switch to the official Scrabble app, newcomers to the game on Facebook (like me), will find Scrabble easier to get into, easier to use, and just as competitive and fun.

The two apps have a lot in common. Both let you quickly and easily invite people from your list of friends. Both let you manage multiple games. Both keep track of games scores and multiple-game ratings. Both have useful features that let you shuffle the tiles in your rack, chat with your competitors, look up valid two-letter words and access a Scrabble-official word look-up feature.

Scrabble's game interface is more intuitive than Scrabulous, and it looks nicer, too. The screen automatically redraws when an opponent makes a move or leaves a message; Scrabulous requires a manual refresh. This is not a big deal if you're playing a drawn-out asynchronous game with a correspondent, but if you want to play in real-time with someone it's a drag to use Scrabulous.

I've been in two near continuous matches since I joined Facebook, one against the dastardly Chris Rohlfs (who gets more bingoes than a whole church basement full of old Catholic ladies) and one against the Mother Judd, Sister Judd and Other Brother. It's a great time killer. Join and challenge me.

Posted by Orrin Judd at July 16, 2008 5:54 PM