The stupidest (and hence best) Wordle spoof we’ve seen: Letterle. | Image: @edjeff
Part of the charm of Wordle — this season’s must-play puzzle game — is that you can only do it once a day. But that’s also part of the frustration, too.
For while it is wonderful to think to yourself: “Ah, a coffee break. Time to sit down and do my Wordle” (part and parcel of the indulgent “treat brain” we all seem to have developed during the pandemic), you sometimes want to scratch that puzzle itch just a little longer.
With that in mind, here are some of the best and stupidest Wordle spoofs we’ve seen so far. They either push the format to ridiculous degrees, offer genuinely fun challenges, or are single-click jokes that may, at least, help temporarily release you of your Wordle cravings.
1) Sweardle
This one does exactly what the name suggests. You’re guessing swear words instead of words from Wordle’s more expansive vocabulary. Results are delivered with snippy little remarks: “Correct. I’m sure your mother will be very proud,” and so on.
2) Queerdle
Wordle but yassified, with a pastel background and on-theme congratulations (“Shantay you stay!”). The creator warns that winning words are more likely to be NSFW than with Wordle, but there are shortcuts to winning. As one commenter on Twitter put it: “the secret to Wordle is knowing the distribution of letters in English and opening with words that have a lot of common letters in them. the secret to Queerdle is doing this once and then guessing the gay word.”
3) Letterle
I love a single-click spoof as much as the next person, and Letterle delivers on that score. Every day it offers a new and tantalizing puzzle! Every day you have the chance to test your wits and intelligence by guessing a single hidden letter! How devious!
I got today’s in just six guesses, which, I choose to believe, is as good and as rigorous a proof of Mensa-level IQ as any other test on the market.
4) Absurdle
This is a self-described “adversarial version” of Wordle. As explained here, Absurdle tweaks the rules of Wordle to make the game harder as you take more guesses. While Wordle fixes its objective word each day, Absurdle changes the word you’re hunting for each time you submit a successful guess.
So, for example, Absurdle might start with the word “CIGAR” for which you guess “TERNS.” The game notes that you got the “R” right, but then changes its location with a new word: “REBUT.” And so on and so forth. Basically it makes a game of Wordle harder and longer. But you do get infinite guesses as compensation.
5) hello wordl
This one is exactly the same as Wordle, but you can play multiple times a day and change the length of the word you’re guessing. If you manage to solve anything with more than six letters then congratulations to you. I struggled for 10 minutes with a 10-letter puzzle only to give up and be told the word was… adrenergic. Warning: for masochists only.
If you’ve seen any other decent Wordle spoofs (or just fun alternatives) feel free to drop them in the comments below. The Verge Slack is overrun with Wordle addicts, and we could do with a new way to get our fix.