"but [Everdeen Mason, the Times games editorial director] had some guesses: 'There’s something about it that makes people want to make, like, relatability content about it in a way that they don’t about, like, the crossword or even Spelling Bee. It takes more effort than Wordle. There’s more of a story there.... ...Connections is more memeable. You can make more jokes with that screenshot.... I do want to say,
our goal is not to make people mad.... There’s no like, ‘Muahaha, I just ruined someone’s day.... I think it’s a cognitive thing that happens sometimes that if people feel like they’re punching up or something, if they think that you are unequal to them, whether it’s up or down, they don’t treat you like a human being anymore...."
From
"The NYT Connections Editor Knows What You’ve Been Saying/Wyna Liu makes the game every day. She isn’t sure why it makes people lose their minds" (Slate).
I love doing the Connections puzzle every day — it never makes me mad! — and I enjoy some of the talk about it on TikTok, especially this guy,
purplejusthappens. (Purple represents the toughest of the 4 categories, but once you get 3 categories, whatever is left is the 4th category, and you don't need to understand why these things belong together to finish the puzzle. That's actually a flaw in the game. In the end, only you know if you knew why the final group was a group.)
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16 comments:
The big trick of connections is to have three things that are related, but as you go thru, they are each differently related to other sets of words. So you waste a pick trying to force a match with other words.
So you waste a pick trying to force a match with other words.
I do it on paper and put my answers in once I've solved them all.
The last line is downright silly at times.
It is maddening when one of the words in a group is a slang expression that I, in my dotage, am not familiar with.
I really enjoy Connections, but my first love is still the Spelling Bee. The particular editors’ quirks do infuse both of those games.
On another note, the general Puzzles editor doesn’t exactly have a way with words in this interview.
Homophone of the first word of a Taylor Swift hit spelled backwards ___Off.
My niece and I share our results each day via text. I hadn’t noticed that purple is the hardest, but as I look back I see it’s often my last one. First thing I do is hit Shuffle. Because I think the original order is designed to mislead.
The game can be challenging at first. Once you understand how the creator thinks it’s easy.
The problem with the game is that you can deduce a connection among four words that is stronger than the puzzle maker.
Yeah, the purple default is the main flaw. That's why the main thrill I get is when I make the purple connection before the last group. My main complaint is musical references to post 2000 pap (I meant pop, but that works too).
Sometimes it is fun, once in a great while it is too easy, but about 25% of the time I say "this is just stupid, why do I bother with this game?"
I much prefer Wordle.
For some reason, wordle is morning puzzle and connections is bedtime puzzle.
Is there a word for the amount of time spent considering the last row before you just pick them and find out?
The way to fix the flaw is to add four extraneous words, making twenty. Purple is then selected from eight words and four unrelated words are left over.
It would make it harder to construct.
I do the Connections puzzle every day (along with the Wordle, and sometimes the Spelling Bee), and have never once felt the need to leave a comment. The comment sections for all of these puzzles are rather pathetic. Who are these people and why do they believe anyone cares how they did on today's puzzle?
Thanks to Ann, I became a NYT puzzle geek. I do the puzzles in the morning before work to kick my brain into thinking gear. I love Connections and I am sometimes disappointed that I didn't see the connection, but not mad. Spelling Bee is a favorite and I'm learning to like Strands. Wordle is good, but after hundreds of them, it is easy. I play Red Herring on my Kindle Fire. This game has three categories to match four words/phrases and four extras (red herrings) to make it more difficult. I sometimes google a word to understand it (i.e. today's solfege) so I learn while I play. It's all good!
'The game can be challenging at first. Once you understand how the creator thinks it’s easy.'
That's the key. There are only so many 'tricks' and you tend to learn them.
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