This one and the last one I didn’t have any good answers to.

Though for this one the thing it immediately made me think was “it’s both sides of the coin in one obvious way…”

Having a smart phone means you can’t — as easily without removing the technology as a deliberate block — separate the characters from communication or access to information. So your mystery or he-said/they-said dilemma may not be as hard to solve.

OTOH, a mystery or communication dilemma doesn’t have to slow the plot. Just let them look it up on line / call the dude.

All depends on what you want your game to do with information flow. If you want to slow it, you have to control the phone. If you want to speed it up, then awesome.

In terms of actual phones, one of the sweet things I’ve seen Freeforms do is integrate texting (IC or OOC) as part of the mechanics of the game. Like, you can text other players secret information. Or there are a couple of games setup all around being in your Finnish immersion closet, but you text other players at key points to maintain some level of human contact. That level interests me more — actual utilization of the technology as game mechanic.