You don’t need to download apps to play with your friends. Text games can offer hours of fun on their own, via SMS or chat. There are many fantastic text games out there, and in this article, we’ll help you discover the very best.
Most of these messaging games are simple in nature. And they can offer free entertainment for family and friends, regardless of your age or interests. You can even play with someone you know who still has a wacky phone. Here are some of the best phone games to play with text.
The rise of mobile games
The rise in the number of smartphones has turned mobile gaming into an irresistible force of nature. Everyone knows such big names as Angry Birds, Candy Crush Saga and Pokemon GO. And then there are free mobile games with no ads or in-app purchases worth playing.
What if you don’t want to download and install another new app on your phone? What if you just want to play a simple game via SMS or your favorite chat app? Fortunately, there are tons of fun text games you can play, and here are the best ones …
1. Narrator
Image Credit: Laura / Flickr
As a writer, I tell stories for fun. But even non-writers who find it difficult to create worlds, characters and storylines on their own can enjoy this simple text messaging game.
With Story Builder, one of you starts a story by sending a message to the other. The other person then sends a second sentence of the story to the first person. Slowly but surely, the two of you build your story through multiple texts or a thread of messages.
Variants include sentences containing a certain number of words or characters, or even sentences containing exactly 160 characters. Although anyone who has used Twitter before the character count has increased knows how difficult it can be.
2.20 questions
Image Credit: Alexander Henning Drachmann / Flickr
These are the classic 20 questions that originated in the United States and spawned both radio and television programming. The concept of this game is elegantly simple, but requires a certain degree of intelligence to do so.
One of you thinks about an object or person, while the other asks questions via a text message. Your yes / no answers help the fortuneteller narrow down the possibilities until they can make an educated guess about what you were thinking.
Variations include limiting the subject to a specific genre. In addition, you can increase / decrease the number of questions that the fortuneteller can ask.
3. Spy
Image Credit: Courtney Emery / Flickr
This is the classic I Spy game, a game that has been loved by families for generations. Of course, as a child, we played the long road trip by car. And the version played via SMS or chat is just as fun.
Start by telling your opponent where you need to give at least one combat chance. So look around until your mind is focused on something specific. Then your opponent had to guess what you were following, and only the first letter of the object had to be guessed.
Variations include providing clues after each negative answer to a wrong guess, or limiting the number of guesses allowed.
4. Lyrics
Image Credit: Michael Coghlan / Flickr
Assuming you’re not exclusively interested in instrumental music, you will know a few measures of certain songs. Whether it’s because of an emotional attachment or simply because they sound good together, most people have been influenced by the lyrics in some way.
The Song Lyrics game plays on this by making the person quote lines from one song to another through lyrics. Then the other person has to guess the song from which the words are taken. It helps if it is played with someone you are close to or have a common musical preference with.
Variations include classic film lines or game plots. Not guessing correctly can mean having to call and sing a song to your opponent.
5. Abbreviations
Image Credit: Michael Coghlan / Flickr
Acronyms are everywhere, as you can see from the trendy Internet acronyms you need to know . You can also shorten your entire life by describing what you are doing using only the first few letters of each word in this description.
To play contractions, one of you is cutting what you are doing. For example: “In a cafe in the city” it becomes “IACSIT”, and another starts trying to cancel the abbreviation of a short phrase in its original form. Be prepared for some rude answers.
Variations include providing more than just the letter of each word and abbreviating something different from your current business. Like what you really think about the person you are playing against.
6. List of builders
Image Credit: Nenad Stojkovic / Flickr
We are all building lists. They describe everything in detail, from our daily responsibilities to our shared life goals; what products do we need for the gadgets we want to buy in the future. When you’re turning into a game, making lists can be very fun, especially with text.
List Builder is a competitive game in which each player takes turns choosing a name that belongs to a specific genre. These could be capitals, actors from a specific series, or whatever your mind can think of. The last person successfully added to the list is considered the winner.
Options include reading the alphabet one letter at a time, or having the next answer starting with the same letter that ended the last answer.
7. Where am I?
Image Credit: Steve Cadman / Flickr
The reason we all carry smartphones is because we are not always at home. What makes this game perfect for playing on mobile devices.
In “Where am I?” Each player takes turns describing the characteristics of his environment, while the other tries to guess where he is. You can do this as easy or as difficult as you like by changing the level of detail you give your opponent.
Variations include restricting the house, with the room you are in the correct answer, or the question of which store in town you are in. Could you also change this to Who am I? instead, describe the person or people who are there with you.
8. Kiss, marry, kill
Image Credit: Jeremy Wandel / Flickr
You may know Kiss, Marry, Kill as something else. A kiss, for example, can be slightly more intense than a simple kiss on the cheek. However, the basic concept is the same and fun, if not offended by the answers provided.
One person names three people, be they celebrities or people you both know, and asks the question, “Kiss, marry, kill?” Then the other must determine which of the three will kiss, whom will marry, and whom will kill. All for a joke, you know.
Variations include releasing certain names in the mix that you know will piss your friend off. Or by completely changing the question. While there are three options and three names in the mix, the sky is the limit.
9. What if …?
Image Credit: Anton Petukhov / Flickr
If you are inclined to daydream, you should be familiar with the concept of “what if?” Once one of these scenarios comes to your mind, you can take a few minutes to figure out which option you would choose in that scenario. What is the perfect feed for sms games.
One of you sends a message to the other in “What if?” script and asks what they will do in this situation. There are no right or wrong answers. Not only is it fun to see the answers, but it can also provide insight into your friends or family’s life prospects.
Variations include leaving the question open with any possible answer, or providing multiple-choice answers and forcing the other person to choose one.
10. Simple quiz
Image Credit: James Cridland / Flickr
Any tests can be fun, even if they seem to check your IQ. And it doesn’t have to be a long and complicated affair when the quiz master asks difficult questions.
In the form of a messaging game that you can play in a chat application, Simple Quiz requires one of you to post messages for a general question. Then the other person should try to give the correct answer or, if it’s a little silly, the funniest answer imaginable.
Options include going for a web browsing skill test in an effort to find an answer online in no time.
What kind of phone games do you like on your phone?
These SMS games range from the simplest to the most difficult. But they are all extremely playable between two (or more) people with a phone in hand. It doesn’t matter if it’s a smartphone or a phone ( reasons to buy a phone ).
With 160 characters at a time (or more if you use a chat app like WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger), you can have fun with each other between you and a friend or family member. Even your old nanny with her original Nokia 3310 can join in the fun.
