NYT Goes After Worldle, Which Sounds Just a Bit Like Wordle

Played any Worldle lately? Not Wordle (we got you, didn't we)—Worldle, a geography-themed game whose name is so close to the famous online word-based game that the owner of the latter is now going after the former. The BBC reports that the New York Times, which scooped up Wordle from creator Jason Wardle in 2022 for seven figures, has filed a legal challenge that alleges Worldle is "creating confusion" between the brands, and riding the coattails of the "enormous goodwill" behind the original game.

• The games: Wordle, which is played by millions, can be played via a web browser or on an app. By contrast, there's no app for Worldle, and it features ads (there's an ad-free version, available for about $13 a year). Kotaku describes it as such: "You are put into a Google Street View location, and have six guesses to pinpoint your exact location on a map of the world." About 100,000 people play Worldle each month.

• More from the NYT: The geography game is "nearly identical in appearance, sound, meaning, and imparts the same commercial impression to ... Wordle," the paper's legal complaint notes. It wouldn't offer further comment beyond the filing.
• Pushback: Worldle creator Kory McDonald, a software developer, dismisses the Times' complaint, noting lots of games exist with the "le" ending. "Wordle is about words, Worldle is about the world, Flaggle is about flags," he tells the BBC. He also calls it "pretty humbling" that so many people have taken to his game, noting, "I didn't expect it to have this sort of success at all."
• Those other games: Worldle isn't the only similar-sounding game that may have the Times up in arms. There's also Heardle (in which players have to ID music); Nerdle (involving math); and even another Worldle, which has players try to ID countries around the globe based on their outlines. It's not clear if the NYT is going after that Worldle as well.

(More Wordle stories.)