Wordle

A few games found an unexpected spotlight during the pandemic, mostly thanks to their ability to bring people together digitally when in-person interactions were less common. However, I was still blindsided by Wordle. Contrary to most other COVID-era hits, it initially seems as single-player as a game can get. The only thing that helps get your friends involved is the spoiler-free share option, but that ended up being a lot more important than I had given it credit for. Now the game is big enough to make news headlines every day, and the rights were even bought by The New York Times for their own collection of daily word games. As a daily Wordler myself, I think it can be a fun challenge, and it's definitely better when playing alongside friends.

When I first played Wordle, I was immediately reminded of Mastermind. The idea is generally the same, but instead of a pattern of colors, you are trying to guess a five letter word. You get up to six guesses, and each time you can see what letters from your guess are actually in the solution, as well as whether or not they were placed in the correct location. What makes this a little more difficult is the fact that you can only guess real words, so you'll assuredly have some wasteful overlap in your guesses. However, once you've played enough, you'll find a strategy that works for you and overlap will hardly be an issue anymore. That probably won't happen right away though, thanks to the fact that Wordle is truly a daily word puzzle. Everyday, you'll have the same challenge as everyone else, and once you solve it, you'll have to wait until the next day to play again. It's this, alongside the lack of monetization, that sets Wordle apart from the thousands of word games available on mobile devices today, and it's a breath of fresh air.

I think that Wordle is set up perfectly to stay popular, at least for a while. If it wasn't limited to a single puzzle per day, I could see myself playing a lot in one big burst and then falling off just as quickly. Instead, I look forward to my little daily word puzzle, and it always feels like it's done too soon. You literally can't play it enough to get burnt out. Being on the same puzzle as everyone else I know also makes the subtext of competition a little more enticing. It's okay to miss a day, and nobody needs to waste any time catching up to their friends, which is a lot more forgiving than other free multiplayer experiences tend to be. All in all, Wordle only offers a bite-sized bit of entertainment every day, but it's so approachable and player-friendly that I can hardly think of a reason not to play it.

The game is available online here (as of 2/13/22): https://www.nytimes.com/games/wordle/index.html