A game if Wordle
(Picture: Wordle)There comes a time – if it hasn’t happened to you already – where you’ll see a flood of yellow, green and black square emojis on your Twitter timeline with the word ‘Wordle’ and wonder if we’ve all lost our minds.
Wordle is in fact a new online game created by Brooklyn software designer Josh Wardle for his partner, who loves taking on the puzzles printed in The New York Times.
Yes, the game’s name is a pun, because of course it is.
Limited to just one game a day – which Mr Wardle says “encourages you to spend three minutes a day” on it “and that’s it” – users have six chances to guess a five-letter word from the dictionary.
Each time a guess is submitted, each letter will turn a different colour. Black means the letter isn’t in the word at all; yellow indicates that the letter is in the word, but you’ve put it in the wrong place; and green means you have it in the correct position.
Oh, and letters can be repeated, just to make things a little trickier.
Mr Wardle told The New York Times in an interview: “I think people kind of appreciate that there’s this thing online that’s just fun.
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“It’s not trying to do anything shady with your data or your eyeballs. It’s just a game that’s fun.”
The game has taken Twitter by storm this week, with ‘Wordle 404 x’ trending on the site on Sunday after many failed to guess the day’s hidden word.
Of course, when a new trend comes along, the memes soon follow.
The Ever Given Wordle
One user suggested that we were all still recovering from a viral trend from last year, when the Ever Given cargo ship blocked the Suez Canal:
Everyone is posting their Wordle boxes out of a subconscious longing for her pic.twitter.com/NODBLazE3n
— Jennifer Morrow (@jenniferemorrow) January 7, 2022
A lack of interest
In their own take on the ‘or sorry that happened’ meme, Netflix employee Marc Snetiker channelled the feeling experienced by those who maybe don’t care all that much about the latest viral game:
Wordle pic.twitter.com/BktJ3OWMoB
— Marc (@MarcSnetiker) January 5, 2022
It’s not a Covid variant
Let us have this brief moment of respite. Please.
Based on the tweets in my timeline I assume the new variant is called wordle.
— Hend Amry (@LibyaLiberty) January 8, 2022
It’s not Star Trek either…
I don’t know what wordle is exactly and the pictures people post don’t help and the vibe I’m getting is that game on Star Trek TNG that everyone got addicted to pic.twitter.com/0RnkrolHM8
— Paul F. Tompkins (@PFTompkins) January 7, 2022
And no, it’s not a Pokémon
That would be a Squirtle.
ok...so wordle is NOT a pokemon
— astropolitical/sociophysical (@keshawnrants) January 7, 2022
The struggle
It happens to us all.
Me staring at my remaining letters on Wordle after ten minutes and 4 incorrect guesses pic.twitter.com/rdgLgiC1ID
— David (@betbinch) January 9, 2022
I’m just like everyone else. I start my day by trying to squeeze as many vowels as possible into a 5 letter wordle
— Vinny Thomas (@vinn_ayy) January 8, 2022
wordle: name a 5-letter word
— jonny sun (@jonnysun) January 6, 2022
my brain: …TUNA
wordle: literally any 5-letter word
my brain: …QUENCH
wordle: LITERALLY JUST TYPE IN THE FIRST 5-LETTER WORD THAT COMES INTO YOUR HEAD
my brain: …LOPPO?
wordle: A WORD. A REAL WORD THAT IS 5 LETTERS LONG
my brain: … BBBBB
struggling with this Wordle pic.twitter.com/OKbChP7X00
— Toby Earle (@TobyonTV) January 9, 2022
When one puzzle a day is not enough…
12am then: fuck should’ve gone to sleep hours ago
— Annabel McCarthy (@annabelrmc) January 9, 2022
12am now: fuck yea new wordle
Wordle Art
One of them looks pretty sus if you ask me.
this wordle shit easy
— jarvis johnson (@jarvis) January 8, 2022
⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛
⬛⬛🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩⬛⬛
⬛⬛🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩⬛⬛
⬛⬛🟩🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨⬛
⬛⬛🟩🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨⬛
⬛⬛🟩🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨⬛
⬛⬛🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩⬛⬛
⬛⬛🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩⬛⬛
⬛⬛🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩⬛⬛
⬛⬛🟩🟩⬛⬛🟩🟩⬛⬛
⬛⬛🟩🟩⬛⬛🟩🟩⬛⬛
(youth pastor voice) Lately a lot of people are playing this game “Wordle.” But I know another fun game, with another kind of Word, the Good Word of Jesus Christ, that will have your score looking like this.
— Joppingway (@padraicratigan) January 5, 2022
⬛️⬛️🟩⬛️⬛️
⬛️🟩🟩🟩⬛️
⬛️⬛️🟩⬛️⬛️
⬛️⬛️🟩⬛️⬛️
⬛️⬛️🟩⬛️⬛️
first time playing wordle is this a good score
— lauren (@NotABigJerk) January 5, 2022
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟩🟩🟨🟨🟩🟩
🟩🟨⬜️⬜️🟨🟩
🟩🟨⬜️⬜️🟨🟩
🟩🟨⬜️⬜️🟨🟩
🟩🟨⬜️⬜️🟨🟩
🟩🟨⬜️⬜️🟨🟩
🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️🟨
🟨⬜️🟨🟨⬜️🟨
🟩🟨🟩🟩🟨🟨
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩
Accessible Wordles
It’s not really a meme, per se, but still important nonetheless.
With Wordle generating a grid of emojis when sharing it to social media, screen readers have a tough time understanding what all the squares mean and will read out each one individually.
Not fun.
So accessibility specialist Stacey Jenkins has this advice:
I am only going to say this once, I promise, but...
— Stacey Jenkins (@StaceyofGotham) January 4, 2022
Posting walls of emojis is inaccessible. Screen reader users are going to hear "green square green square yellow square" without any meaning.
If you're posting your Wordle results, try screenshot + add alt text instead💕
We don’t know how long this trend will last, but given the state of the world right now, we’re here for it.
