Wordle Postgame Report, January 31, 2023

The Wordle Postgame Report is a brief analysis of a game of Wordle, the five-letter-word guessing game now owned by the New York Times. If you do not play Wordle, Indignity encourages you to please skip this item. The existence of the Wordle Postgame Report does not constitute an endorsement of playing Wordle, of not playing Wordle, or of the New York Times.

January 31, 2023, CROSS, 5/6

I REASSURED MYSELF I was playing a higher-variance strategy but really FILMY was the only word I could come up with as a starter. The sight of it turning up all gray made me come up with PASTE, which I'd somehow also never played, but which only came up with a yellow S. It was going to be this kind of a game, fumbling around in the dark. I used up the rest of the vowels with SOUND, but only added a yellow O to the yellow S. By now, though, the eliminated letters were telling me something. The O had to hold the whole word together, so it would go in the middle spot, after a consonant combination, and then—well, the letter supply was so depleted, it seemed safe to double up the S. If I was going completely wrong, I still had a spare turn to try something else. I played GROSS. Gray followed by four greens. Right concept, wrong consonant combination. The only alternative was the C. The sort of game that leaves one irritated.

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