If you’ve been a follower of Facebook or Twitter for very long at all, you’ve either noticed new postings by your friends of a block of squares five rows across and a variety of two to five rows down filled with a series of either gray, yellow or green boxes. Next to the block appears the word Wordle and a score. The purpose of the game is to guess a five-letter word in as few tries as possible. The game was invented by software engineer Josh Wardle because his partner enjoyed word games so much. But Wordle has now quite literally taken the internet by storm.
Initially, Wardle released the game in October 2021 for free. Players guess one five-letter word in a 24-hour period; everyone playing has the same word. In December 2021, Wardle added the feature whereby the tries and the final correct guess were kept secret via the use of colored tiles – green means the letter is correct and in the correct position; yellow indicates that the letter is in the word but it’s in the wrong position; and gray means that the letter isn’t in the word at all. By keeping the results secret to players who had yet to play that day’s game, this new feature caused the game to go viral as players shared their results across social media platforms. The game went from having about 90 plays in November to well over two million by the middle of January 2022.[i] That’s only a matter of three months, folks!
If you’re wanting to jump on the Wordle bandwagon though, beware. If you search for Wardle’s Wordle game on your phone’s app store, you’ll have no luck, but you will find a variety of clones that have already copied Wardle’s game such as Absurdle in which the target word changes every time you guess and Sweardle, which (you guessed it) only contains swear words. When you guess the word, you’ll be rewarded with a snippy remark like “Correct. I’m sure your mother would be very proud.”[ii] While created using American spelling, it has now expanded into over 90 different languages.[iii] In fact, this viral sensation could result in an entirely new addition to language.
Could it even be added to the dictionary? Here’s a list of what I’ve created under the heading of wordle:
Noun – a type of person who easily becomes addicted to online word games.
He sat at his computer for hours looking for new word games to play – he had, in
fact, become a wordle.
Verb – the act of playing online word games
I need my computer! I haven’t wordled yet today. I must wordle every day. It’s very
important to wordle.
Adverb – being uneasy or worried about playing online word games
I wordlely await the next opportunity to play my games.
Adjective – eager and excited about your online game score
I have mastered all of the online word games! I am the wordle champion!
Even if wordle doesn’t become a new word in the dictionary or a household name, the game has definitely changed Josh Wardle’s world. (Say that three times in a row!) Just last week, Wardle’s word game captured the attention of the New York Times with a goal of increasing their online reader subscriptions. The company has paid Wardle a cool seven-figure price, and even though the report is that it’s a “low seven figures,” let me show you what that looks like at a minimum -- $10,000,000. All I can say is this – well played, Josh Wardle, well played.
[i]Hall, Rachel (January 11, 2022). "Wordle creator overwhelmed by global success of hit puzzle.” The Guardian. Archived from the original on January 11, 2022. Retrieved February 6, 2022. [ii]Vincent, James (January 11, 2022). "Done your Wordle for the day? Try out these spoofs instead.” The Verge. Archived from the original on January 11, 2022. Retrieved February 6, 2022. [iii]Lokot, Tanya (February 5, 2022). "'Your'dle: Wordle is now available in many of the world's languages.” Global Voices. Retrieved February 6, 2022.
Comments