I admit it, I'm an addict. Words with Friends has been a daily ritual for me for two years. I'm not as bad as some users, though. I recently tried to start a game with a previous opponent who had exceeded the number of simultaneous games allowed—20. I usually have a comparatively modest four games going on at any time, but my life would be less without them. The mobile crossword-building game gives you a way to keep up with faraway friends, giving your mind a break from whatever other stresses you might have.

The Alec Baldwin plane incident established Words firmly in the culture, and there's no doubt that it's one of those apps a platform needs to have to be a real mobile player. The Windows Phone version doesn't disappoint; in fact it's among the most feature-complete apps I've encountered, compared with its iPhone and Android counterparts. But as I've run into while reviewing other Windows Phone apps, you don't get everything.

You can fully play the game and even chat, but there's just that missing cake icing. In Word's case, it's the lack of extra-cost plugin tools like those for word-suggestion and point-counting. There's an argument that these tools actually make for a worse, less-pure game. Still, it's yet another case where the Windows Phone version lacks something available in the other platforms.

Words with Friends differs from the time-honored Scrabble game from which it draws inspiration in some key ways: Only actual words in the game's dictionary can be played—there's no challenging; the board layout is a bit different, with more triple point spaces; and letters have different values. The asynchronous nature of the game is one of its best features—you can play whenever you're ready. There's no rush—as long as you make a move within 11 days. Here's a blog with a fairly complete list of differences between Scrabble and Words with Friends.

Installation

You can get Words with Friends from the Windows Store or from the Games tile's "get more games" link. There's only a paid version, which is pleasantly ad-free. The Windows store allows trial versions, and you can get a free ad-supported version on iOS, but for some reason Zynga doesn't offer a free app for Windows Phone. I installed and tested the app on a spiffy Nokia Lumia 928. Because I'd read some comments on the app's store page about problems with the Nokia Lumia 1020, I installed the game on that phone as well, where it worked without a hitch for me.

No special permissions are requested at installation. I always have trouble remember that games only appear in the Games hub, and not among the full applications list that's a swipe right from the home screen, so don't think you've made a mistake when you don't find Words there.

To start playing, you can sign in with a Facebook account or an email address. You have to be over 13 to play, but really, there's nothing objectionable about the game. Once you've chosen an unused player name, a permission bar asks if you want notifications for when it's your move—a good idea. Then Welcome to Words with Friends appears where you games in progress will later, and tapping this shows you the various ways to find an opponent.

If you tap and hold the game's tile in the game hub and choose "pin to start" the resulting tile will not only give you easy access to the game, but if you have a move to make it will occasionally flip over and indicate that, along with the relevant opponent.

Playing the Game

One of Word's nicer characteristics is that you can either play against people you know or someone random across the Internet. After some playtime, it can even match you to people of similar skill levels. To get folks you know, you can find them through Facebook or through your contact list. A final option is to simply use Words as an offline game in which you pass the mobile to the player whose turn it is.