Did Wordle get harder?

Last month, the New York Timesannounced it had bought the hit internet game Wordle - and people are now speculating that the game has suddenly become harder.

Monday's Wordle answer - "cynic" - threw everyone for a loop. The game does not indicate there are double letters unless players insert the same letter twice and the order of letters in "cynic" was difficult for players to figure out initially.

The day before that, the answer, "ulcer", also left many players scratching their heads.

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Where did these infrequently used, strange-lettered words come from?

The sudden difficulty uptick has left Wordle users wondering if the Times has made the game harder upon buying it.

But the paper says it did not alter the game, according to communication director, Jordan Cohen, who told multiple publications: "Nothing has changed about the gameplay."

However, a report by The Verge indicates that the Times did alter acceptable guesses and possible solutions when they switched the platform from the original host to their own. The Times removed offensive words as potential guesses and answers and changed any spelling from the British format to the American.

The Times even removed "obscure" words that would be more difficult to guess. For example, today's original answer was "agora" but they skipped this to make it easier to solve.

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