This is why people are outraged by the New York Times Connections game

The game makers behind it The New York Times‘ Connections has people riled up over Wednesday’s puzzle.

For those who don’t know the addictive game: Connections is a puzzle game based on the New York Times Website. Players are presented with a grid of 16 words and the task is to arrange the words into four groups of four by revealing the “connections” between them. These categories could be, for example, elements in the periodic table or types of flowers.

Each group of connections is color-coded according to difficulty. The yellow group is the easiest, while the blue and green groups are of medium difficulty. The purple group is usually the most difficult to understand.

However, players only have four chances to make each connection, and if you guess incorrectly, you lose a life. However, when you’re close to guessing the correct group, a message will appear on the screen letting you know that you’re just one word away from the correct pairing.

Seems simple enough, right? Well, the folks behind Connections are known for trying to trick players with words that sound like they belong to the right group, but actually aren’t. That was the case in the game on Wednesday, February 7, when the first four words on the grid referenced everyone’s favorite sponge under the sea: “Sponge” and “Bob” and “Square” and “Pants.”

While the words referred to the iconic Nickelodeon cartoon, SpongeBob SquarePantsPlayers weren’t thrilled with the obvious trick, as the grouping wasn’t really the solution to the puzzle. On X, formerly Twitter, users shared their frustrated reactions to Wednesday’s Connections puzzle.

“This doesn’t charm me,” posted one person on X along with a screenshot of the Connections group “Sponge Bob SquarePants.”

“NYT Connections said: “Who lives in a pineapple under the sea?” another user jokingly said.

“NYT Connections, you will pay for your silly crimes,” wrote a third person, while someone else posted: “NYT Connections that pay respect to a legend.”

In the meantime, some people have taken the opportunity to call out those who fell for this obvious mind game.

“Anyone who falls for this today is an idiot,” said one user.

“If you thought sponge, bob, square and pants were a category today then I’m sorry but this game is not for you,” said another.

As for the actual answers to Wednesday’s Connections game, players were presented with 16 words: Sponge, Bob, Square, Pants, Hook, Free, That, Circle, Ray, Diamond, Cross, Crab, Triangle, Squid, Weave and Fest.

Spoiler alert: The yellow group’s category was sea creatures, the green group’s was simple two-dimensional shapes, the blue group’s was boxing maneuvers, and the purple group’s was expressions that started with “fancy.”

Crab, ray, sponge and octopus belonged to the group of sea creatures or the yellow group. The group of basic two-dimensional shapes included the words circle, diamond, square and triangle. The blue group or the category of boxing maneuvers consisted of bob, cross, hook and wave. And finally in the purple group were tight, free, pants and that.