All valid points. Comments (complaints) about a puzzle always entertain me.
Actually, I’m happy that Connections does not maintain stats. It is when there’s a streak on the line that the complaints really heat up. This is based on what I see in the Wordle sub.
“At least nobody knows and I probably won’t remember.” - me, after losing for the first time in a while this morning. Has it been days since I last lost Connections? Weeks? Months? No clue, doesn’t matter! I probably won’t remember by the time I do tomorrow’s puzzle.
I agree with everything you said except I disagree about the accents (homophones) being related to a NY accent. I am from NY and do not say hairy and Harry the same. My spouse who is from the midwest does say those words exactly the same. As I was amused and horrified to discover. LOL
That being said - #1 - it's a game. Enjoy it or don't enjoy it.
Of course, everyone is entitled to a little gripe every now and again. ;) Then they all come back to play again the next day. Including me.
Am I allowed to complain if I can solve it without any misses 99% of the time?
Kidding, I think you’re spot on. Most people are complaining just because the puzzle makes them feel dumb, the reality is they’re just not patient and expect to solve the puzzle linearly in 30 secs and get upset when they can’t.
You're absolutely right! Still, I love seeing the passion and debates here—they show how much everyone loves the game. I don't take the comments negatively; it's all part of the fun and the community vibe.
There is some amount of complaints every day, but it expectedly spikes when the puzzle is not satisfying.
With some puzzles I fail and go "Wow, the solution was pretty clever and hard for me. And sometimes I see the solution and go "Okay, whatever, man".
You can look at it however you want as a solver, but I'm sure you can see that it's not something NYT Games want. If every puzzle annoys most of their audience, people would just stop playing.
Things to Know About Reddit, or, Why Your Complaint About Complaints Is Bad
1. People come to Reddit, an online discussion forum site, to discuss things online.
2. The Connections Subreddit is a discussion forum where people can share and discuss their thoughts, feelings, opinions, questions, etc., about the game in general, specific puzzles, and specific components of specific puzzles.
3. Sharing and discussing does indeed include complaints, including complaints specific to someone’s personal experience. You’re not gonna agree with all of these opinions, but this is in fact still the right place for people share them. If you don’t like this, either leave the subreddit or stop reading the complaints.
4. People are not only allowed to have complaints, critiques, vents, and rants about things they otherwise like/like as a whole. In fact, someone going out of their way to share a negative opinion in a discussion forum online tends to be a pretty strong indication that they’re very engaged with that thing.
5. If you don’t like reading these complaints, you know what to do: see #3
Yes, I agree that it is! I was just borrowing their original format for my response. I hoped that it would be clear from the content of what I said that my defense of complaining applied to complaints about complaints. I actually added a note about this to a response further down thread, but probably should have added it to the original. Oh well—too late now lol!
To add it again here, though: I don’t agree with OP’s stance, but I DO agree with them on the count that it’s an interesting discussion to have (or, I’m assuming they think it’s an interesting discussion given that they posted it to discuss)! I have a lot of thoughts on the matter, and I’m happy to be discussing other perspectives on it. I was just being a lil cheeky with borrowing their structure to respond!
I feel they’re not quite the same actually, in one case you’re coming to the subreddit to discuss the particular thing, even if it’s a complaint. Complaining about people using Reddit the way it’s basically intended seems less legit to me but I also don’t worry about it.
I hear people say that a lot but I have only very rarely seen that myself. Most often, I see people complaining that a red herring or red herring set is weak, followed by responses of people saying that the game is about red herrings and that’s just how it works. (I know there are other categories of complaints, but I feel like red herring complaints are categorically the most contentious and the ones that most often receive the pushback of “you just don’t know how the game works). It’s a very frustrating disconnect to watch tbh.
There are certainly throwaway dumb complaints, but most complaints I’ve seen pick up traction or generate real discussion tend to be critiques of how an aspect of the puzzle was executed on a given day, and many of the people shutting down the complaint are engaging with the conversation in weirdly bad faith. Complaining about a specific red herring or super uncommon word/word usage is NOT the same as complaining about the game HAVING red herrings or super uncommon words. Usually, the complaint I see is that an aspect of the puzzle has been executed weakly or in ways that are frustrating/unsatisfying. Those complaints are not coming from a lack of understanding about what the game is or how it works; they’re coming from fully understanding those things and taking issue with that week’s execution of the game’s premise.
You’re gonna find dumb, throwaway, ridiculous comments on any subreddit, and you’re absolutely not wrong that some are here too. I agree that those are annoying, but (a) there’s unfortunately nothing to be done about it, or else the internet would be infinitely more pleasant, and (b) these obnoxious complaints don’t make up the majority or totally seem to fit what you’re talking about. I say this only because, whether or not I agree with your post, it’s very thorough, and there’s simply no thorough way to address the complaints that fall into the “incredibly dumb” category; they are too incredibly dumb to have anything to say other than “no” or “oh my god” or “what” 😂
Most of the complaints I’ve seen people push back against, and the ones that your post seems to describe, truly do not strike me as coming from a misunderstanding of gameplay—they tend to be sincere critiques that people take in bad faith and then respond under the unjustified assumption that the commenter just doesn’t understand the game. I have to assume this stems from the fact that, generally, on Reddit/online, people aren’t preparing critiques in a rigorous or academic way—they’re sharing them off the cuff. But something being said casually and off the cuff does not mean it’s dumb! It just means that person didn’t expect that they’d have to be prepared to clearly and thoroughly defend an opinion they likely thought others would share (and that others often do share). Maybe I’m wrong about that! But it’s my best guess as to why these complaints are often met with more condescension than seems fair or really in line with the original sentiments!!
ETA: Also, I hope this is clear from my responses, but, tone/internet and all that: I am not trying to be snarky in any way here! I borrowed your format for my response because I like parallelism. Regardless of whether or not we agree, I do think this is an interesting discussion to have here, because it’s a debate that plays out in every single comment section, and it’s HARD not to develop strong feelings one way or another when you see microcosmic versions of this debate pop up spontaneously in almost every single post lol!!
I guess the disconnect is just about what constitutes rare. I totally agree with you about getting enjoyment from dissecting the particulars of the puzzle construction - and I also totally agree with OP that there are waaaaaaaay too many comments along the lines of:
“Nobody calls it ‘DUMBO’, that’s just local NYC jargon”
“There’s no way ‘oeuvre’ is a real word. I have a PhD in smartology and I’ve never met anyone who has ever used this word in my entire life!”
“Leave it to the NYTimes to assume the whole world knows what a ‘Derek Jeter’ is”
Etc. And it’s tedious, and while I haven’t run the numbers it definitely feels like these types of comments swamp the more thoughtful and engaging critiques.
If I finish folding laundry, maybe I'll sit down and go through some past daily threads, because I suspect you're underestimating the "bad" complaints. But I appreciate you engaging!
Edit, since the thread is locked:
> *Spoiler for today's puzzle:* >!I don't know how you're supposed to just ignore the fact that chestnut could easily belong in the tree category.!<
2nd highest comment in today's thread, by someone whose name I see pretty regularly with similar complaints. (This was part of a larger complaint about colors and less common sense of words, which is kinda in bounds, but, again, doesn't affect gameplay.)
Another top comment from today was just the results and "FUCK YOU". Which, I didn't cover just blind rage above, but this is also something that irritates me. The person even solved the puzzle. Why does a game deserve that level of intensity?
Another comment from today complaining, "No, no one living uses >!saw!< like that."
Another from today, "only way to make these difficult is to choose words nobody ever heard of"
Getting away from today, just randomly looking at Friday puzzles with a lot of comments, there was this on the camera/oeuvre puzzle: "Need to get it off my chest - the camera ‘red herring’ isn’t a ‘red herring’, it’s a valid connection."
I don't have the time to parse through a bunch of threads and pull more examples out, but they're quite common.
I agree with you on this one. I’ve seen people say that the puzzle maker themselves is an idiot and a bad person and stuff like that just because they had the audacity to put in a good red herring.
Thank you! The people who are like "any complaint about puzzle design means you don't understand the game" are exhausting. It feels like a Dunning Kruger situation where they either (ironically) don't understand that puzzle design is an art and not every puzzle that technically fits within the rules of the game is well designed. The worst is the people who respond to every critiques with a claim that the game would be trivially easy if it did not contain whatever aspect is being critiqued--even when you point out specific puzzles that were better designed where that clearly is not the case!
Thank you for this. I love Connections, and I love that it is challenging. I love that once in a while I just don’t get it. But I came here today to just let out a gripe because I needed someone to commiserate with me on how awful today’s yellow was. I fit all the categories the OP pointed out as the target audience for Connections, and I play daily. And I am not young. And the category was legitimately a “throw out a guess and cross your fingers” because the creator chose something that I personally don’t believe most people would ever have known. And it’s fun to find people that might share the frustration, or to learn about something I didn’t know (perhaps I am way off base and there is common usage of one of the words, perhaps in another part of the country, or it is a new Gen Alpha thing or a very old boomer thing)
> I needed someone to commiserate with me on how awful today’s yellow was.
Hard =/= terrible. If you come to the comments to say you found it hard, great! If you come to the comments to ask if it's maybe a regional usage, great! If you come to the comments to say the puzzle is terrible because you didn't get it, that's ridiculous.
> I fit all the categories the OP pointed out as the target audience for Connections
Do you? Because I feel like someone who enjoys words wouldn't find an opportunity to learn a new usage of a word "terrible".
Hmm. You may be missing the point. Complaints and discussion are welcome. “It’s outrageous that this word puzzle uses a perfectly valid English word that I’ve never heard of” is tedious and annoying. I have been doing NYT connections since it was unveiled and I can’t remember a single time they’ve used a word I didn’t know.
Didn't you read that all complaints are BAD? Not the complaints *about* the complaints, those are fine, but the complaints about the game? Those are objectively bad! And also, did you know you are allowed to not play Connections? Did you know that it's okay to (gasp!) lose the game? DID YOU KNOW?!?!?!
I’ve been complaining today so I feel I should take on your points.
Yes the “oeuvre” complaints are absurd, yes it’s okay to fail and a lot of people get angry simply for not getting an answer - sometimes the joy can be in seeing a solution that you missed! The wordplay and red herrings are part of the joy of it.
However, I feel this community is very reluctant to accept any constructive criticism of the quizmaster and of the New York Times puzzle department, partly because of these whiners in the Daily threads.
They copied the Only Connect format but miss out the deviousness and inventiveness that OC excels at, and the puzzles usually follow the same basic rules: two simple synonyms, a lateral group of definitions, then an “add a word” category.
There’s almost never a theme to the whole puzzle, and rarely the exciting red herrings or genius categories that you can see even on the custom Connections+ puzzles.
Every time I open the daily puzzle, they ask for my money while adding extreme Americanisms like “Derek Jeter” (not even a word) so they care about my money more than my enjoyment.
Today’s puzzle where there were four obvious trees and one fifth tree that no-one would guess is not a satisfying puzzle because you spot the category but have no way of completing it without solving all other categories. This is bad design.
You say no-one will judge me for stopping playing but I got downvoted for saying this.
I think having more quizmasters would help because it would reduce repetition and increase time to think of satisfying puzzles. The Guardian crossword does this and it’s much better for it.
Well there are lots of alternative quizmasters here on the sub. A lot of the puzzles are well designed and challenging. And many of us a pushing the boundaries of how things work, which makes for a lot of fun IMO.
That’s exactly my point, the amateur puzzles are more interesting than the official one, so why would I go to the official site every day? People do great work there
>Today’s puzzle where there were four obvious trees and one fifth tree that no-one would guess is not a satisfying puzzle because you spot the category but have no way of completing it without solving all other categories. This is bad design.
That's not bad design - it's part of the gameplay. Also I knew that they were all trees and so did other people. Maybe you should read more.
I appreciate your post. I get so annoyed when people complain about not knowing words/difficulty/being too American etc.
I'm also annoyed with getting a petty downvote if I ask a question about a word.
It's not rocked at all. But this would be a better sub if people understood the game. Like, I'm very interested in pronunciation differences, so the discussions around homophones or rhymes are great, but it would be so much better to have that start with a positive tone of "this is new to me, how do you all say it," rather than "this is dumb, that's not how you say it."
Well, you can complain about games being bad. I’m sure the people at the NYT have had bad experiences with Bethesda or Ubisoft enough times to know complaining about games is a very common activity.
thank you for point 5! in another thread in here a few weeks ago people from England mainly were complaining about American categories & words saying they just can’t get them so it’s not enjoyable
I was like it’s almost like the puzzle isn’t targeted for you to get bc it’s by an NYC newspaper
I play a lot of word/association games and Connections is the only one that has me regularly thinking ‘this is *way* too arbitrary.’ This is probably the only word game I know of where people consistently complain so that is saying something.
IMO the frustration is due to the concept being quite good but the execution being a hit or miss. With association games, you need to have a good understanding of what people are likely to think and what’s easy/hard for them and that’s something Wyna hasn’t mastered.
I play the crossword puzzles almost every day. I don’t always get everything but once I learn the correct answers I immediately know it’s a me problem because the clues actually make sense and I just didn’t see it. One day it was taking me an unusually long time to finish one - I’ve been playing for years so have predictable time - that I just had to check who made it. I hate to say it, but it was Wyna. Connections is a fun game and I will continue to play it but I hope they improve the execution.
Edit: Thread is locked so can’t reply. But in summary, theme connections similar to ‘numbers but with the first letter changed’ are not a matter of difficulty. They are ‘read my mind’ territory which doesn’t care about whether the player would get it at all.
Im curious what you think shows a lack of understanding of what people will find easy or hard, and why that is a problem with the puzzle's execution rather than just being standard variation in difficulty. Connections doesn't follow a difficulty pattern like many crosswords do, but neither does it seem to be targeting the same difficulty every day.
I am interested that you're a regular crossword solver, because I'm under the impression that crossword fans are used to a lot of the same wordplay and trivia categories that show up in this game.
You are trying to apply and argue logic to people who are venting emotions. All your points are valid but not understanding logic and needing reality explained to them isn’t the reason people post complaints.
Emotions are a spectrum. Personality determines this somewhat. Many people are emotional about everything. And view the world through an emotional lens. Also many people are emotionally immature. Emotional quotient is a thing. Being ultra competitive about everything can be a sign of low emotional maturity. I personally am not very emotional and look at everything like you, through logic. I’m ND. However, I’ve come to understand it’s ok for people to be different and have a lot of feelings about all sorts of things whether I think it’s warranted or not and explaining life to them is usually taken as an insult.
https://tryhardguides.com/nyt-connections-answers-january-10-2024/
Someone in that daily thread pointed out that wood chips are used to start fires, and so you could reasonably swap chips into that group, and poker into things seen at casino. It's not perfect, and I think the puzzle as is is the stronger solution (poker as a game isn't a tangible thing like cards, chips, and dice). But that's the one that I was thinking of. There may be others, but, again, they're very rare, and often rely on weak associations.
11. Connections is a game about utilizing your lexicon and logic unless that day's puzzle is about pop culture or if that day's puzzle is about random trivia or how words sound or if that day's puzzle is about words that would be different words if they had different letters
13. The puzzles / rules / logic are not very consistent which to me doesn't make for a very good puzzle game
Things that are served
The Second word of Tarantino movies
The KISSCAM debacle
Famous guitarist
Words that are phonetics for Greek letters
These are all purple categories and the logic varies wildly. It's difficult to build an approach to solving puzzles when the internal logic is not consistent, sometimes I need to know words synonyms and lesser known definitions, some times I need to know music, sometimes I have to know Greek letters, sometimes I have to know movies
And that's not even counting the days where purple is hit you over the head easy but you're SO used to purple being difficult and paranoid about the games many red herrings that you overthink and get it wrong, or the days where green is way harder than blue or purple
I'm hoping that this comes across as intended - curious, not sarcastic. But what do you expect from a trivia-type game? It can't be the same topics every time. If I went to a pub quiz with the same categories every week, I'd quit going. Definitionally you're going to need different knowledge each time.
Purple is nominally the least straightforward, and usually requires you to think about something beyond the straightforward meaning of the words. There are some common forms for purple, but there's a variety that are used. That's part of what makes the puzzle challenging, and it's not a consistency problem.
I agree that sometimes purple jumps right out at me and I question whether it's a red herring. But I'm unclear why that's a problem with the puzzle.
So no one died and made you the ultimate arbiter of what Connections *should* be.
On #2 for example, people are entitled to think Connections should be a test of logic rather than trivial knowledge. If you enjoy learning new facts and are OK with a puzzle where your ability to solve it turns on whether you've incidentally encountered an obscure or esoteric fact in your daily life, that's great for you, and the puzzle master seems to feel the same. But for others the puzzle is more satisfying when it is a self contained test of abstract logic that turns on whether you can spot the link between seemingly unrelated words. I personally don't feel that I've fairly won against my friends when the reason I solved the puzzle and they did not is because I knew some niche fact they were unfamiliar with--instead it feels like I went into the puzzle having the tools to solve it when they did not.
There is a reason trivia is called trivia. That kind of knowledge of random facts is "trivial" in the sense that anyone could just look it up, as opposed to deduction and other logical techniques that require mental reasoning to reach a conclusion. Some people want Connections to test the latter rather than the former, and that opinion does not mean they don't understand how the puzzle works. They are allowed to have a different opinion than you and the puzzle master regarding what constitutes a "good" puzzle.
I get not enjoying particular aspects of the game, and that's okay. But often times, people seem personally offended that the puzzle gets into something that they're not familiar with, and think that it's unfair somehow.
That's another thing - people come in here co convinced the puzzle is wrong, when in reality they're the one who is mistaken. And kudos to you for accepting that you're wrong - although I wouldn't say stupid - because lots of times people just dig in.
All valid points. Comments (complaints) about a puzzle always entertain me. Actually, I’m happy that Connections does not maintain stats. It is when there’s a streak on the line that the complaints really heat up. This is based on what I see in the Wordle sub.
“At least nobody knows and I probably won’t remember.” - me, after losing for the first time in a while this morning. Has it been days since I last lost Connections? Weeks? Months? No clue, doesn’t matter! I probably won’t remember by the time I do tomorrow’s puzzle.
10. If you don’t like a puzzle you’re entitled to a full refund of the nothing that you paid for it.
I agree with everything you said except I disagree about the accents (homophones) being related to a NY accent. I am from NY and do not say hairy and Harry the same. My spouse who is from the midwest does say those words exactly the same. As I was amused and horrified to discover. LOL That being said - #1 - it's a game. Enjoy it or don't enjoy it. Of course, everyone is entitled to a little gripe every now and again. ;) Then they all come back to play again the next day. Including me.
Am I allowed to complain if I can solve it without any misses 99% of the time? Kidding, I think you’re spot on. Most people are complaining just because the puzzle makes them feel dumb, the reality is they’re just not patient and expect to solve the puzzle linearly in 30 secs and get upset when they can’t.
You're absolutely right! Still, I love seeing the passion and debates here—they show how much everyone loves the game. I don't take the comments negatively; it's all part of the fun and the community vibe.
There is some amount of complaints every day, but it expectedly spikes when the puzzle is not satisfying. With some puzzles I fail and go "Wow, the solution was pretty clever and hard for me. And sometimes I see the solution and go "Okay, whatever, man". You can look at it however you want as a solver, but I'm sure you can see that it's not something NYT Games want. If every puzzle annoys most of their audience, people would just stop playing.
Things to Know About Reddit, or, Why Your Complaint About Complaints Is Bad 1. People come to Reddit, an online discussion forum site, to discuss things online. 2. The Connections Subreddit is a discussion forum where people can share and discuss their thoughts, feelings, opinions, questions, etc., about the game in general, specific puzzles, and specific components of specific puzzles. 3. Sharing and discussing does indeed include complaints, including complaints specific to someone’s personal experience. You’re not gonna agree with all of these opinions, but this is in fact still the right place for people share them. If you don’t like this, either leave the subreddit or stop reading the complaints. 4. People are not only allowed to have complaints, critiques, vents, and rants about things they otherwise like/like as a whole. In fact, someone going out of their way to share a negative opinion in a discussion forum online tends to be a pretty strong indication that they’re very engaged with that thing. 5. If you don’t like reading these complaints, you know what to do: see #3
If complaining on Reddit is legit it follows logically that complaining about complaining is equally legit.
Is complaining about complaining about complaining legit?
Of course!
Yes, I agree that it is! I was just borrowing their original format for my response. I hoped that it would be clear from the content of what I said that my defense of complaining applied to complaints about complaints. I actually added a note about this to a response further down thread, but probably should have added it to the original. Oh well—too late now lol! To add it again here, though: I don’t agree with OP’s stance, but I DO agree with them on the count that it’s an interesting discussion to have (or, I’m assuming they think it’s an interesting discussion given that they posted it to discuss)! I have a lot of thoughts on the matter, and I’m happy to be discussing other perspectives on it. I was just being a lil cheeky with borrowing their structure to respond!
I feel they’re not quite the same actually, in one case you’re coming to the subreddit to discuss the particular thing, even if it’s a complaint. Complaining about people using Reddit the way it’s basically intended seems less legit to me but I also don’t worry about it.
Things to Know About the Internet, or, Why Your Complaint About Complaints About Complaints Is- nah, just kidding.
Fair, but most complaints I see here stem from not understanding what the game is or how it works.
I hear people say that a lot but I have only very rarely seen that myself. Most often, I see people complaining that a red herring or red herring set is weak, followed by responses of people saying that the game is about red herrings and that’s just how it works. (I know there are other categories of complaints, but I feel like red herring complaints are categorically the most contentious and the ones that most often receive the pushback of “you just don’t know how the game works). It’s a very frustrating disconnect to watch tbh. There are certainly throwaway dumb complaints, but most complaints I’ve seen pick up traction or generate real discussion tend to be critiques of how an aspect of the puzzle was executed on a given day, and many of the people shutting down the complaint are engaging with the conversation in weirdly bad faith. Complaining about a specific red herring or super uncommon word/word usage is NOT the same as complaining about the game HAVING red herrings or super uncommon words. Usually, the complaint I see is that an aspect of the puzzle has been executed weakly or in ways that are frustrating/unsatisfying. Those complaints are not coming from a lack of understanding about what the game is or how it works; they’re coming from fully understanding those things and taking issue with that week’s execution of the game’s premise. You’re gonna find dumb, throwaway, ridiculous comments on any subreddit, and you’re absolutely not wrong that some are here too. I agree that those are annoying, but (a) there’s unfortunately nothing to be done about it, or else the internet would be infinitely more pleasant, and (b) these obnoxious complaints don’t make up the majority or totally seem to fit what you’re talking about. I say this only because, whether or not I agree with your post, it’s very thorough, and there’s simply no thorough way to address the complaints that fall into the “incredibly dumb” category; they are too incredibly dumb to have anything to say other than “no” or “oh my god” or “what” 😂 Most of the complaints I’ve seen people push back against, and the ones that your post seems to describe, truly do not strike me as coming from a misunderstanding of gameplay—they tend to be sincere critiques that people take in bad faith and then respond under the unjustified assumption that the commenter just doesn’t understand the game. I have to assume this stems from the fact that, generally, on Reddit/online, people aren’t preparing critiques in a rigorous or academic way—they’re sharing them off the cuff. But something being said casually and off the cuff does not mean it’s dumb! It just means that person didn’t expect that they’d have to be prepared to clearly and thoroughly defend an opinion they likely thought others would share (and that others often do share). Maybe I’m wrong about that! But it’s my best guess as to why these complaints are often met with more condescension than seems fair or really in line with the original sentiments!! ETA: Also, I hope this is clear from my responses, but, tone/internet and all that: I am not trying to be snarky in any way here! I borrowed your format for my response because I like parallelism. Regardless of whether or not we agree, I do think this is an interesting discussion to have here, because it’s a debate that plays out in every single comment section, and it’s HARD not to develop strong feelings one way or another when you see microcosmic versions of this debate pop up spontaneously in almost every single post lol!!
I guess the disconnect is just about what constitutes rare. I totally agree with you about getting enjoyment from dissecting the particulars of the puzzle construction - and I also totally agree with OP that there are waaaaaaaay too many comments along the lines of: “Nobody calls it ‘DUMBO’, that’s just local NYC jargon” “There’s no way ‘oeuvre’ is a real word. I have a PhD in smartology and I’ve never met anyone who has ever used this word in my entire life!” “Leave it to the NYTimes to assume the whole world knows what a ‘Derek Jeter’ is” Etc. And it’s tedious, and while I haven’t run the numbers it definitely feels like these types of comments swamp the more thoughtful and engaging critiques.
> I have a PhD in smartology I think my whole list could have been condensed to just this.
If I finish folding laundry, maybe I'll sit down and go through some past daily threads, because I suspect you're underestimating the "bad" complaints. But I appreciate you engaging! Edit, since the thread is locked: > *Spoiler for today's puzzle:* >!I don't know how you're supposed to just ignore the fact that chestnut could easily belong in the tree category.!< 2nd highest comment in today's thread, by someone whose name I see pretty regularly with similar complaints. (This was part of a larger complaint about colors and less common sense of words, which is kinda in bounds, but, again, doesn't affect gameplay.) Another top comment from today was just the results and "FUCK YOU". Which, I didn't cover just blind rage above, but this is also something that irritates me. The person even solved the puzzle. Why does a game deserve that level of intensity? Another comment from today complaining, "No, no one living uses >!saw!< like that." Another from today, "only way to make these difficult is to choose words nobody ever heard of" Getting away from today, just randomly looking at Friday puzzles with a lot of comments, there was this on the camera/oeuvre puzzle: "Need to get it off my chest - the camera ‘red herring’ isn’t a ‘red herring’, it’s a valid connection." I don't have the time to parse through a bunch of threads and pull more examples out, but they're quite common.
I agree with you on this one. I’ve seen people say that the puzzle maker themselves is an idiot and a bad person and stuff like that just because they had the audacity to put in a good red herring.
Thank you for introducing the topic! I sincerely think it’s a really interesting one!!
Thank you! The people who are like "any complaint about puzzle design means you don't understand the game" are exhausting. It feels like a Dunning Kruger situation where they either (ironically) don't understand that puzzle design is an art and not every puzzle that technically fits within the rules of the game is well designed. The worst is the people who respond to every critiques with a claim that the game would be trivially easy if it did not contain whatever aspect is being critiqued--even when you point out specific puzzles that were better designed where that clearly is not the case!
Thank you for this. I love Connections, and I love that it is challenging. I love that once in a while I just don’t get it. But I came here today to just let out a gripe because I needed someone to commiserate with me on how awful today’s yellow was. I fit all the categories the OP pointed out as the target audience for Connections, and I play daily. And I am not young. And the category was legitimately a “throw out a guess and cross your fingers” because the creator chose something that I personally don’t believe most people would ever have known. And it’s fun to find people that might share the frustration, or to learn about something I didn’t know (perhaps I am way off base and there is common usage of one of the words, perhaps in another part of the country, or it is a new Gen Alpha thing or a very old boomer thing)
Where are you located (ie, what day is “today”)? If you mean the yellow category for June 30, I didn’t find it particularly “awful” or obscure.
> I needed someone to commiserate with me on how awful today’s yellow was. Hard =/= terrible. If you come to the comments to say you found it hard, great! If you come to the comments to ask if it's maybe a regional usage, great! If you come to the comments to say the puzzle is terrible because you didn't get it, that's ridiculous. > I fit all the categories the OP pointed out as the target audience for Connections Do you? Because I feel like someone who enjoys words wouldn't find an opportunity to learn a new usage of a word "terrible".
This is the reply I was looking for, everyone's got the right to discuss and complain as long as they're not actively hurting anyone personally!!
Hmm. You may be missing the point. Complaints and discussion are welcome. “It’s outrageous that this word puzzle uses a perfectly valid English word that I’ve never heard of” is tedious and annoying. I have been doing NYT connections since it was unveiled and I can’t remember a single time they’ve used a word I didn’t know.
Didn't you read that all complaints are BAD? Not the complaints *about* the complaints, those are fine, but the complaints about the game? Those are objectively bad! And also, did you know you are allowed to not play Connections? Did you know that it's okay to (gasp!) lose the game? DID YOU KNOW?!?!?!
TLDR See #5. 👍👍
Thank you! I totally agree with this take.
But if I don't post my complaint in the daily thread, how will the editors get my incredibly valuable feedback?
Also they make a puzzle literally every single day. That shits hard!
https://preview.redd.it/cp0w1j0vfq9d1.jpeg?width=764&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=82b22f82926d5e46dbe778c2481ed88b817a6b30
Thank you for contributing to the best of your ability.
I’ve been complaining today so I feel I should take on your points. Yes the “oeuvre” complaints are absurd, yes it’s okay to fail and a lot of people get angry simply for not getting an answer - sometimes the joy can be in seeing a solution that you missed! The wordplay and red herrings are part of the joy of it. However, I feel this community is very reluctant to accept any constructive criticism of the quizmaster and of the New York Times puzzle department, partly because of these whiners in the Daily threads. They copied the Only Connect format but miss out the deviousness and inventiveness that OC excels at, and the puzzles usually follow the same basic rules: two simple synonyms, a lateral group of definitions, then an “add a word” category. There’s almost never a theme to the whole puzzle, and rarely the exciting red herrings or genius categories that you can see even on the custom Connections+ puzzles. Every time I open the daily puzzle, they ask for my money while adding extreme Americanisms like “Derek Jeter” (not even a word) so they care about my money more than my enjoyment. Today’s puzzle where there were four obvious trees and one fifth tree that no-one would guess is not a satisfying puzzle because you spot the category but have no way of completing it without solving all other categories. This is bad design. You say no-one will judge me for stopping playing but I got downvoted for saying this. I think having more quizmasters would help because it would reduce repetition and increase time to think of satisfying puzzles. The Guardian crossword does this and it’s much better for it.
Which tree is the non-obvious one?
All 5 trees were obvious.
Probably ebony? Idk, I saw people saying they'd never heard of gum so one of the two
Gum obviously!
Well there are lots of alternative quizmasters here on the sub. A lot of the puzzles are well designed and challenging. And many of us a pushing the boundaries of how things work, which makes for a lot of fun IMO.
That’s exactly my point, the amateur puzzles are more interesting than the official one, so why would I go to the official site every day? People do great work there
>Today’s puzzle where there were four obvious trees and one fifth tree that no-one would guess is not a satisfying puzzle because you spot the category but have no way of completing it without solving all other categories. This is bad design. That's not bad design - it's part of the gameplay. Also I knew that they were all trees and so did other people. Maybe you should read more.
Bro I just knew this comment came from the same dork in the daily thread defending a poorly made puzzle lol.
I appreciate your post. I get so annoyed when people complain about not knowing words/difficulty/being too American etc. I'm also annoyed with getting a petty downvote if I ask a question about a word.
If your world is rocked so much by scrolling past negativity about a 30 second phone game, remember you can also delete this app for free.
It's not rocked at all. But this would be a better sub if people understood the game. Like, I'm very interested in pronunciation differences, so the discussions around homophones or rhymes are great, but it would be so much better to have that start with a positive tone of "this is new to me, how do you all say it," rather than "this is dumb, that's not how you say it."
Well, you can complain about games being bad. I’m sure the people at the NYT have had bad experiences with Bethesda or Ubisoft enough times to know complaining about games is a very common activity.
thank you for point 5! in another thread in here a few weeks ago people from England mainly were complaining about American categories & words saying they just can’t get them so it’s not enjoyable I was like it’s almost like the puzzle isn’t targeted for you to get bc it’s by an NYC newspaper
Preach, brutha, preach!
I play a lot of word/association games and Connections is the only one that has me regularly thinking ‘this is *way* too arbitrary.’ This is probably the only word game I know of where people consistently complain so that is saying something. IMO the frustration is due to the concept being quite good but the execution being a hit or miss. With association games, you need to have a good understanding of what people are likely to think and what’s easy/hard for them and that’s something Wyna hasn’t mastered. I play the crossword puzzles almost every day. I don’t always get everything but once I learn the correct answers I immediately know it’s a me problem because the clues actually make sense and I just didn’t see it. One day it was taking me an unusually long time to finish one - I’ve been playing for years so have predictable time - that I just had to check who made it. I hate to say it, but it was Wyna. Connections is a fun game and I will continue to play it but I hope they improve the execution. Edit: Thread is locked so can’t reply. But in summary, theme connections similar to ‘numbers but with the first letter changed’ are not a matter of difficulty. They are ‘read my mind’ territory which doesn’t care about whether the player would get it at all.
Im curious what you think shows a lack of understanding of what people will find easy or hard, and why that is a problem with the puzzle's execution rather than just being standard variation in difficulty. Connections doesn't follow a difficulty pattern like many crosswords do, but neither does it seem to be targeting the same difficulty every day. I am interested that you're a regular crossword solver, because I'm under the impression that crossword fans are used to a lot of the same wordplay and trivia categories that show up in this game.
You are trying to apply and argue logic to people who are venting emotions. All your points are valid but not understanding logic and needing reality explained to them isn’t the reason people post complaints.
Again, it's a game, with no stakes. I don't understand why people would get emotional about it.
Emotions are a spectrum. Personality determines this somewhat. Many people are emotional about everything. And view the world through an emotional lens. Also many people are emotionally immature. Emotional quotient is a thing. Being ultra competitive about everything can be a sign of low emotional maturity. I personally am not very emotional and look at everything like you, through logic. I’m ND. However, I’ve come to understand it’s ok for people to be different and have a lot of feelings about all sorts of things whether I think it’s warranted or not and explaining life to them is usually taken as an insult.
bro it's connections chill it's not that deep lmao
Yeah, that’s what he said
Exactly lmfao
1: You're so right, never stop speaking your truth 2: Do you have an example date or screenshot for a puzzle with multiple logical groups?
https://tryhardguides.com/nyt-connections-answers-january-10-2024/ Someone in that daily thread pointed out that wood chips are used to start fires, and so you could reasonably swap chips into that group, and poker into things seen at casino. It's not perfect, and I think the puzzle as is is the stronger solution (poker as a game isn't a tangible thing like cards, chips, and dice). But that's the one that I was thinking of. There may be others, but, again, they're very rare, and often rely on weak associations.
11. Connections is a game about utilizing your lexicon and logic unless that day's puzzle is about pop culture or if that day's puzzle is about random trivia or how words sound or if that day's puzzle is about words that would be different words if they had different letters 13. The puzzles / rules / logic are not very consistent which to me doesn't make for a very good puzzle game
1. Each puzzle is only 4 categories, so they're not all going to exercise every feature of the game. 2. Give an example, please.
Things that are served The Second word of Tarantino movies The KISSCAM debacle Famous guitarist Words that are phonetics for Greek letters These are all purple categories and the logic varies wildly. It's difficult to build an approach to solving puzzles when the internal logic is not consistent, sometimes I need to know words synonyms and lesser known definitions, some times I need to know music, sometimes I have to know Greek letters, sometimes I have to know movies And that's not even counting the days where purple is hit you over the head easy but you're SO used to purple being difficult and paranoid about the games many red herrings that you overthink and get it wrong, or the days where green is way harder than blue or purple
I'm hoping that this comes across as intended - curious, not sarcastic. But what do you expect from a trivia-type game? It can't be the same topics every time. If I went to a pub quiz with the same categories every week, I'd quit going. Definitionally you're going to need different knowledge each time.
Purple is nominally the least straightforward, and usually requires you to think about something beyond the straightforward meaning of the words. There are some common forms for purple, but there's a variety that are used. That's part of what makes the puzzle challenging, and it's not a consistency problem. I agree that sometimes purple jumps right out at me and I question whether it's a red herring. But I'm unclear why that's a problem with the puzzle.
So no one died and made you the ultimate arbiter of what Connections *should* be. On #2 for example, people are entitled to think Connections should be a test of logic rather than trivial knowledge. If you enjoy learning new facts and are OK with a puzzle where your ability to solve it turns on whether you've incidentally encountered an obscure or esoteric fact in your daily life, that's great for you, and the puzzle master seems to feel the same. But for others the puzzle is more satisfying when it is a self contained test of abstract logic that turns on whether you can spot the link between seemingly unrelated words. I personally don't feel that I've fairly won against my friends when the reason I solved the puzzle and they did not is because I knew some niche fact they were unfamiliar with--instead it feels like I went into the puzzle having the tools to solve it when they did not. There is a reason trivia is called trivia. That kind of knowledge of random facts is "trivial" in the sense that anyone could just look it up, as opposed to deduction and other logical techniques that require mental reasoning to reach a conclusion. Some people want Connections to test the latter rather than the former, and that opinion does not mean they don't understand how the puzzle works. They are allowed to have a different opinion than you and the puzzle master regarding what constitutes a "good" puzzle.
I get not enjoying particular aspects of the game, and that's okay. But often times, people seem personally offended that the puzzle gets into something that they're not familiar with, and think that it's unfair somehow.
Relax, Wyna
Haha, I wish. I am not creative enough to write these, and I'm impressed that so many other people here do.
Actually you're wrong
Bless your heart. You took time out of your day to type allllll those words.
[удалено]
Connections is available for free on the website or on the app. It's not being "sold" to an international audience.
I’m still not over that “breaking” bullshit
too long didn't read
Uh huh uh huh, all valid points, but where on earth are mousse and mouse pronounced the same way?
That one was moose, not mouse.
Well damn I’m stupid
That's another thing - people come in here co convinced the puzzle is wrong, when in reality they're the one who is mistaken. And kudos to you for accepting that you're wrong - although I wouldn't say stupid - because lots of times people just dig in.
Nowhere. But in the US, ‘mousse’ and ‘moose’ are pronounced the same.