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MGM takes Words With Friends to TV

MGM Television has partnered with mobile game creator Zynga to develop a TV version of its hit Words With Friends app.

Zynga’s Words With Friends game

The Words With Friends game launched in 2009 and has been installed more than 200 million times, with its creators claiming more than 55 million matches are being played at any moment. No broadcaster is attached yet.

It’s the latest project for the television arm of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) which industry veteran Mark Burnett was hired to launch and run in 2015. Earlier this week it expanded with the acquisition of Real Housewives producer Evolution Media.

Barry Poznick, president of unscripted for MGM, said: “The interactive social experience of Words With Friends makes it the perfect mobile game for us to bring to primetime, following our success with Beat Shazam on Fox.

“Playing Words is a daily ritual for some of the biggest names in Hollywood and we’ve created the perfect format to capture their competitiveness and creative wordplay.”

Mobile games are providing rich IP pickings for gameshow creators, with US broadcaster CBS ordering a TV version of Candy Crush that has since been released globally as a format.

Fox debuted Beat Shazam, which requires contestants to guess songs before the music-identifying Shazam app, in May and has already ordered a second season.

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