New York Times new game prompts question from Only Connect host over similarities

Victoria Coren Mitchell has responded to the launch of a new game from the New York Times, pointing out the “similarities” between it and her BBC show Only Connect.

Coren Mitchell has hosted the fiendishly difficult quiz programme since 2008, which sees contestants attempt to uncover connections in a series of cryptic clues.

Wyna Liu is the Associate Puzzle Editor at the New York Times. Earlier this week Liu posted about a new game being introduced called “Connections”.

It calls on players to find “group words that share a common thread”, with a set of 16 tiles all containing different words. The aim of the game is to identify groups of four which share a connection.

Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter

The “connecting wall” round of Only Connect also tasks players with finding groups of connecting words hidden in a grid. Coren Mitchell replied to a Twitter post from Liu about “Connections” and questioned the similarities between the two formats.

“Do you know this has been a TV show in the UK since 2008 ?! It’s so similar I guess you must do?” the presenter wrote.

Only Connect is one of the BBC’s most popular quiz shows. The programme aired its 18th series at the end of last year and sees competitors, who compete in teams, trying to find the links between seemingly random clues.

The show consists of three rounds. The first, connections, sees teams given up to four clues and tasked with identifying the connection. The sequences round is similar, but this time guests are asked to identify what the fourth clue in the sequence would be.

The connecting wall round is third, followed by the missing vowels round. The latter comes in the form of a series of word clues which are presented to the teams without vowels.

indy100 has reached out to the New York Times for comment.

Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.