As Wordle continues to grow in popularity, a new country based spin-off, Worldle, adds to the growing list of games inspired by the daily puzzle title.
Where Wordle asks players to guess a five-letter word, Worldle uses countries. As spotted by Rockpapershotgun, Worldle uses the mechanics of its inspiration, with one puzzle presented per day and limited guesses to narrow down the answer.
However, while Wordle gives you clues in the form of correct letters and correct placement, Worldle uses distance and percentage. Each guess will tell you in kilometres how far your guess is from the right answer, an arrow to indicate what direction the country is from your guess, and a percentage that shows proximity.
Where Wordle can become a repeatable process of elimination by wiping out common characters, Worldle is based entirely on geographic knowledge. Each puzzle comes with an image of the countries borders to provide a jumping-off point. Worldle also uses a handy autofill to ensure you spell a country correctly.
Worldle is a free in-browser game that refreshes daily and can be found on its website.
The New York Times (NYT) recently acquired Wordle for a price in the “low seven figures”, which has had some fans concerned that the game will not remain free-to-play. Fans are now saving the webpage to download six years worth of Wordle puzzles to protect themselves from NYT’s potential payment system.
Wordle’s creator Josh Wardle said that the game would be free-to-play for everyone once it moves to the NYT website; however, a statement from the company suggests that this will not be permanent. The announcement said Wordle will “initially remain free to new and existing players.”
In other news, itch.io has said on Twitter that “NFTS are a scam” and will not be promoted through the site.
