TechRadar Shares Saturday Answers for Connections, Quordle and Strands

For NYT Connections #1210, TechRadar reported four groups. The yellow group, starting with terms for 'toilet,' was CAN OPENER, HEAD WAITER, JOHN DENVER and W.C. FIELDS. The green group, ending in musicals, was ELBOW GREASE, FAT CATS, LINDA HAMILTON and SOMETHING WICKED. The blue group, starting with U.S. museums, was BROAD BEAN, GETTY IMAGES, MET HALFWAY and WHITNEY HOUSTON. The purple group, ending in fantasy creatures, was DIET SPRITE, MERV GRIFFIN, NY GIANT and RIVER PHOENIX. TechRadar's writer rated the puzzle Hard and said he finished with one mistake. He wrote that the WC in W.C. FIELDS unlocked the game for him, and that the final eight tiles were solved more by luck than judgement.

For Quordle #1713, TechRadar listed CHORE, FLYER, STICK and PURSE as the four answers. Its hints said the puzzle contained four different standard vowels, no repeated letters, no Q, Z, X or J, and no two answers beginning with the same letter. The starting letters were C, F, S and P. The Quordle Daily Sequence for game #1713 used TWICE, BAKER, SCRUB and FRISK. The writer said every word worked out and that the solve required little thinking, helped by starter words that produced many letters and by common letter combinations.

For NYT Strands #944, the theme was 'A figment of your imagination.' TechRadar reported the answers as MIRAGE, ILLUSION, CHIMERA, SPECTER and PHANTASM, with WILLOTHEWISP as the spangram. The spangram had 12 letters and touched the bottom first column and the top sixth column. The writer rated the puzzle Hard and used one hint, which revealed CHIMERA. He said he got MIRAGE right away and expected an easy game, but the puzzle took longer. TechRadar also noted that will-o'-the-wisp is a ghostly flickering light seen over bogs, swamps and marshes at night, and distinguished it from a 1970s British children's cartoon called Willo The Wisp.

The guides noted that new Connections, Quordle and Strands puzzles appear at midnight for each player's time zone, so some users are playing what others call yesterday's game. NYT Connections and Strands are playable for free through the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile, according to TechRadar. Quordle was described as one of the original Wordle alternatives and remains active after more than 1,500 games. The articles also linked to previous-day answers, including Connections game #1209 and Strands game #943, and to TechRadar's Wordle coverage.