While Bucknell provides its community with a free subscription to the New York Times, this subscription, to our dismay, does not include the games. Regardless, there are plenty of free options available on the NYT’s website or app (though I’ll admit the discounted subscription price has tempted me once or twice).
For anyone unfamiliar, the NYT offers a variety of mini-games that utilize words, numbers and patterns. The games update daily, most of them restarting at midnight. I’d like to think that these little games are giving my brain an exercise of sorts… especially when I’m procrastinating other things by playing them.
I’ve listed the games roughly in the order that the app displays them, and therefore in the order that I play them.
Spelling Bee: In this game, you’re given seven letters to build words with, with the letter in the center needing to be included in each word. Like many spelling games, the goal is to make longer and more unique words to achieve the best score. I’m sorry to any “Spelling Bee” enjoyers out there, but this one unfortunately doesn’t make it into my regular rotation. I’ve just never been much of a speller, and I’m willing to admit that growing up with autocorrect has done myself and many others no favors there.
Wordle: “Wordle” seemed to take the world by storm in late 2021, especially with the lingering limitations of Covid-19 leading many to seek out some form of distanced connection. In this game, you are given six chances to guess a five-letter word and are then given hints on how close you are to guessing that word based on a yellow, green and black coding system.
The age-old question is, what’s the best starting word to guess? Which will give you the most beneficial hints off the bat? Many people aim to get as many vowels out of the way as possible, lending to “adieu” as a common first guess. Around the time of “Wordle’s” initial surge, I read an article that found “crate” to be the most statistically beneficial word. Admittedly, this article was written so early on that there’s likely a better starting word out there if you poke around. For whatever reason, I still can’t get that article out of my head and have been loyal to using “crate” ever since.
Strands: “Strands” is a much newer addition to the NYT games docket, and its sudden appearance in the list certainly threw me off. It was difficult to get the hang of at first, but I’ve come around to it. “Strands” is akin to a word search, except you will utilize all of the letters given to you. You’re given a pretty vague hint, and your goal is to find five to seven words related to the theme, along with a “spangram” that more clearly states the theme. This game, like a few others, does offer hints, which can be racked up by guessing words that aren’t necessarily the right words. Sometimes, if the topic is really obscure, you’re going to need that first hint to get you started, and may as well just aim to find words with the required four-letter minimum. It’s not my favorite mini-game, but like I said, I’ve come around to it. I’d say that your success per daily game really depends on how familiar you are with the given theme—I figured out the one on cat breeds pretty quickly.
Connections: Before “Strands” rearranged my order, “Connections” was second on my list. In this game, you’re given 16 words or phrases, and your goal is to group four of them into four common categories. They are organized in terms of, what I would call, level of obscurity, with yellow being the easiest to guess and purple being the most difficult. I personally enjoy “Connections,” but I swear that sometimes they’re just grasping at straws with these categories. The purple category was once something along the lines of “fruits without their first letter.” How in the world is anyone meant to guess that? At that point, it’s just going to become a process of elimination, or just a really good guess.
The Mini Crossword: Unfortunately, the full-sized crossword has been reserved by the NYT for their highfalutin subscribers (kidding), but we’ve still got its little sibling. There’s not much I can say about a game so commonly known, but I will note that I like the NYT’s attempts to keep some of the hints relevant to pop culture (there was a “Brat” mention recently).
Sudoku: I will die on the hill saying that “Sudoku” is an underrated game, but perhaps I’m biased as someone who has been playing it from a young age. To the untrained eye, a “Sudoku” board may be quite intimidating, and many assume that its use of numbers equals math. But fear not, it doesn’t! This classic Japanese game is centered around patterns, just like many others in the NYT app. A “Sudoku” board is composed of nine squares, each of which are composed of nine smaller squares, which in the end will all be filled with the numbers one through nine. Each horizontal and vertical row (18 total) will also be composed of numbers one through nine. The overall goal: ensure there is no overlap of numbers. The same number cannot exist in the same box or row, so in the end, it’s all just a process of elimination. And I’m sure that probably all still sounds like a lot, but if you haven’t yet, I recommend you give “Sudoku” a try! Although don’t tell me if you’re able to do the medium and hard levels, because I can only do the easy ones. Keep that to yourself.
Letter Boxed: Look, this game is another spelling-centered one and I can’t do it either. It hurts my head. The only “Letter Boxed” I care about is “Letterboxd,” the movie review app (sorry).
Tiles: Last but not least is “Tiles,” which has only recently entered my rotation. This is another pattern-focused game, where the goal is to continuously match similar attributes on each “tile,” and see how long you can continue that chain without a mistake. Sometimes the art on the tiles is really beautiful, but it’s also sometimes downright overwhelming. My only complaint is that I was quite disappointed when I found out that there only exists a limited rotating number of tile designs. Yes, the game designers have plenty on their hands to figure out each day. But with repeated designs, there’s little drawing me back to the game besides seeing if I can manage a longer chain of matches.
