With the public release of Wordle in October, 2021, people have started to create similar games, which has popularized the daily browser game format.
This genre is categorized by its accessibility and quickness. Simply open up an internet browser, type in the URL of the game and start playing. No sign up or payment required.
These games should take about 5-10 minutes to play, something done during breakfast or a quick break during work.
With so many of these games being made, the Clarion has created a list of some of these games to help readers find a new game to add to their daily routine.
The games have been ranked on the following metrics:
- Simplicity – how easy the game is to understand
- Speed – how quick the game takes to play
- Fun – how fun the game is to play
- Obscurity – how niche the game is for an average person.
Each category is ranked on a scale of one to 10, one being the worst and 10 being the best.
8. Squaredle
Simplicity: 7/10
In Squaredle, players are given a typically four by four square of letters however harder days might have a five by five square and themed days will have a special shape, such as Valentine’s Day being in the shape of a heart. Players must then find all the commonly used words in the square. Words that are rarely used or archaic do not count towards the score.
Speed: 1/10
The main issue with Squaredle is that it takes too long to complete. The list of words players have to find can range from 30 to 70 words. On easy days, it may take 15 to 20 minutes. On hard days, it can take literal hours.
Fun: 6/10
For people who like word games, Squaredle is a good brain teaser. For those who struggle with vocabulary or perhaps do not have English as a first language, this game may be harder.
Obscurity: 3/10
Due to Squaredle’s rule of including only commonly used words, most of the time players will not have to know technical or archaic words. However, Squaredle includes some, but not all, slang terms in the word list. There is no indicator or list that shows which are included and which are not, so players will have to guess.
Overall score: 2/10
Squaredle is good to play while waiting for a dentist’s appointment or during a free afternoon when there’s nothing else to do. But, playing Squaredle as a part of a morning routine is terrible as it takes too long to find all the words. For the speed alone, this brings Squaredle to the bottom of the list.
7. Costcodle
Simplicity: 8/10
In CostCodle, players are presented with a random Costco food item and must guess within 5% of the item’s price.
Speed: 9/10
Players are given only six guesses, so unless players are taking several minutes to think about each guess, the game is finished very quickly.
Fun: 5/10
While an interesting gimmick, Costcodle is not that great if the player is not a person who goes to Costco often, or at all.
Obscurity: 2/10
This game has a niche target demographic – frequent Costco goers. For those who do not have a Costco membership, this is a very hard game.
Overall: 4/10
CostCodle requires specific knowledge of Costco prices, and a majority of people do not have that information memorized. This brings Costcodle far down in the rankings.
6. Gamedle
Simplicity: 8/10
In Gamedle, players are shown a small, clear section of a blurred video game cover and must guess the game based off of the unblurred section.
Speed: 9/10
Players are given six chances to guess the game. If their guess is incorrect, more of the game’s cover art is revealed. This incentivizes entering an answer quickly. While there is no timer, if the player does not know the game at first glance, they can press the skip button and gain some more information.
Fun: 4/10
When a player guesses an incorrect answer, all that happens is that more of the video game cover is unblurred and their incorrect guess is added to the bottom of the screen. There are no other helpful hints for the player. This can be somewhat discouraging when playing which brings the fun score down.
Obscurity: 3/10
Similar to CostCodle, Gamedle requires specific knowledge that the average person would not have. However, more people know video game cover art than specific Costco food prices, which puts Gamedle’s obscurity just above CostCodle’s.
Overall: 4/10
Gamedle is for people who know many video games. For anyone else, Gamedle will not be very fun to play.
5. Tradle
Simplicity: 6/10
In Tradle, players are given a graph of a random country’s most exported goods, and must guess what country is being displayed. The simplicity is lower due to Tradle’s user interface. Players are given percentages of the country’s total exports and to get more specific information, they must hover/tap on the percentage. If the player is on a phone, there is a chance that the information displayed gets cut off entirely.
Speed: 8/10
When players make an incorrect guess, they are given how far away from the correct country is from their guess, as well as the direction the correct country is. For example, if the player guessed and the display showed 5,000 kilometers with an arrow pointing left, that means the correct country is 5,000 kilometers west of their guess. This speeds up the game significantly, as players do not have to rely entirely on their knowledge of a country’s trading habits.
Fun: 6/10
Tradle gives players several clues to help them figure out the correct country, which raises its fun score. Due to its hints, players are more likely to guess correctly, and thus feel good about their win. However, if players use all 10 guesses and none of them are correct, Tradle does not tell the player the correct country, which is frustrating.
Obscurity: 6/10
While the name of the game is Tradle, only the first guess requires knowledge of economics. After the first guess, the country can be narrowed down through the location hints.
Overall: 6/10
While fun, Tradle’s overall score is lowered due to the fact that its selling point, the country’s exports and trade, becomes obsolete after the first guess. At that point, why include the exports at all?
4. Worldle
Simplicity: 7/10
In Worldle, players are shown a random country’s outline and must guess the country based on its shape.
Speed: 8/10
Similar to Tradle, when players make an incorrect guess, they are given the country’s distance from their guess and the direction the country is in relation to their guess.
Fun: 7/10
The hints allow players to narrow down their list of potential guesses, keeping the flow of the game going. This gives players a sense of accomplishment as they see the distance between their guess and the actual country get smaller and smaller. And unlike Tradle, players are told the actual country if they do not guess correctly.
Obscurity: 7/10
All Worldle requires is an idea of geography and knowing which countries are in which continent. Though, this is not true if the country is an island nation in Oceania. Those island nations are both small and far apart, which makes guessing them a challenge.
Overall: 7/10
Worldle is a better version of Tradle, but does not give players a gimmick that will not be used during their playthrough.
3. Bandle
Simplicity: 9/10
In Bandle, players are given the first few seconds of a random song and must guess the song. There is no restriction on genre or time era the song may be from. At first, players are given only one instrument of the song but as they guess, more instruments are added to help players.
Speed: 6/10
Bandle is fairly quick to play, but players may have to play parts of the song several times before it clicks or they press skip. This slows down the pace of Bandle significantly.
Fun: 7/10
If players can guess a song based off of a single instrument, there is a great sense of achievement and pride. If they cannot, and require more instruments to figure it out, then it leads to laughing at themselves for not getting it sooner, or they just found a new song to listen to. In either of these cases, Bandle does not feel like it’s punishing players for not guessing correctly.
Obscurity: 8/10
Bandle usually has pop songs from the last forty years as the random song, meaning that players of all ages will likely know at least one song a week. This lets most people play the game and not get frustrated that they have not gotten a correct song in a while.
Overall: 7/10
While having the same score as Worldle, Bandle is ranked higher as it is more available to the average person – more people know pop songs than the exact location of every country on Earth.
2. Wordle
Simplicity: 9/10
In Wordle, players must guess a random five-letter word. When they input their guess, the letters of their guess are colored in accordance to how they appear in the word of the day. If a letter in their guess is green, that means the letter is in the word and in the right spot. If a letter is yellow, the letter is in the word, but in the incorrect position. If a letter is not colored at all, the letter is not in the word.
Speed: 10/10
Wordle is quick to play. Players start guessing immediately by typing in a random five-letter word. There is no information to take in and consider. After the first guess, Wordle’s pace slows down, but unless the word is rare, potential words come fast.
Fun: 8/10
Wordle gives players immediate feedback on how close they are. This encourages players to keep trying and guessing. The share feature adds an extra layer of fun, as players can show their Wordle score to their friends without spoiling the words.
Obscurity: 6/10
There are only so many five-letter words in the English language, and Wordle occasionally uses words that the average person would not know. Wordle has a rule that they do not repeat words from previous Wordles. It is only a matter of time before Wordle starts having to use words like odium, a word meaning intense hatred, or craic, an Irish slang term meaning a good time. This brings the obscurity score down.
Overall: 8/10
Wordle is the game that started the daily browser game trend. It has a simple and quick gameplay loop with high shareability, allowing players to show off their Wordle score to their friends. The only thing that brings Wordle down is that the words are going to become increasingly obscure.
1. Connections
Simplicity: 10/10
In Connections, players are given 16 words. Each of these words fits in one of four categories. These categories are not given to the player. The player must figure out the connections between each of the words and which words are in each group.
Each of the categories has their own color, indicating how hard the category was to guess. Yellow means that the category is straightforward and easy to guess, while purple is the trickiest and hardest to guess.
Speed: 8/10
Players have to read all of the 16 words and group them together. There is no grouping or notes feature in the game itself, so players have to either use a separate notes app or keep the groups in their head while playing. This slows down the pace of the game greatly.
Fun: 9/10
Part of what makes Connections so fun is its category system. Players often find the yellow category first, as it’s the easiest to find. This eases players into the game, giving them confidence to find the other groupings. If a player finds the purple category at the start, they feel rewarded for finding the hardest to find first.
It helps that the sharing system for Connections includes the order players find the categories in, which allows them to show off their scores to their friends.
Obscurity: 7/10
The categories can be confusing at times. A controversial category was “Things in My Favorite Things,” a song that came out in the 1950s. Some younger players were unfamiliar with this song and were frustrated. Furthermore, the categories can be broad.
On May 3, the Connections’ purple category was “Things people shake” and the yellow category was “Corpus,” an uncommon word that the average person would not know. Here is a TikTok of rangsk_yt playing that day’s Connections.
Overall: 9/10
In spite of Connections’ occasionally strange category selection, it is the best daily browser game. What makes Connections the best game in this list is its accessibility, requiring only an open mind and good lateral thinking – most of the time.
