Wordle Blocks Certain Words Following New York Times Switch
Players notice that shortly after the acquisition, The New York Times began removing offensive words, slurs, and slang from the popular game Wordle.
In an email sent to Polygon, a New York Times representative stated that "offensive words will always be omitted from consideration." The representative also revealed that since Wordle has just been acquired by The New York Times, the publication is still in the process of removing offensive words from the game. At the time of writing, players will no longer be able to use gendered and ethnic slurs and other offensive profanities. Doing so would prompt the game to flash a "not in word list" message, encouraging players to come up with a different guess.
Last month is was confirmed that the popular online puzzle Wordle had been bought by The New York Times for a fee of more than $1 million.
Since The New York Times acquisition, some players grew concerned about whether Wordle will remain free on the Times' website. However, Wordle creator, Josh Wardle, confirmed that the game would continue to be free of charge upon selling it to New York Times. This remains to be the case for now, though it wouldn't be unlikely if The New York Times decides to require players to have a subscription to continue accessing Wordle in the future.