Facebook Messenger now offers an ingenious way to pass the time: an addictive basketball minigame that you can access by double-tapping on basketball emojis within conversations. When activated, a hoop will appear and it's your task to shoot some hoops; when successful shots come in celebratory emojis will pop up; otherwise sad faces appear instead.
Though this basketball game may never rival NBA Jam or other classic shoot-em-ups, it provides a fun little timekiller that adds some competition into Messenger conversations. Sharing it is also easy - perfect for killing time while waiting on someone to respond! And diehard fans can keep track of who has more points.
To play basketball via Messenger, open up any conversation on either mobile or desktop and then tap on the emoji icon in the bottom right corner. Choose and send the basketball emoji, which when clicked will take them directly to a special basketball screen in their Messenger app where they can compete against one another and play!
The controls for this game are straightforward: simply flick your finger towards the hoop to try to get it in and you will score. Your high score will then be displayed in the chat window. As you continue scoring, the hoop may move and become harder to hit; additionally, as more points are scored the emojis change accordingly; making this an excellent way to show off your talents among friends!
At present, Facebook's basketball game is only available on the latest version of Messenger app (iPhone and Android) and not supported across all regions. 9to5Mac first noticed it as part of Facebook's recent push to incorporate Instant Games onto Messenger platform. It remains to be seen if this will become permanent feature or just an experiment that will cease once college basketball tournament has wrapped up, but definitely something worth keeping an eye out for!
