This article provides a comprehensive guide to the New York Times Connections puzzle for February 2, 2025, puzzle #602, including hints, answers, and strategies for success. Connections, a word association game, challenges players to group four sets of four words based on shared connections. This particular puzzle presented a range of difficulty, from the straightforward “bummed out” category to the more abstract “words after ‘K'” theme.
The yellow category, themed “bummed out,” comprised the words “blue,” “down,” “hangdog,” and “sorry.” These words are all synonyms or descriptive terms for feeling sad or dejected. This category was considered the easiest of the four, offering a clear and readily apparent connection between the words.
The green category, themed “birds that are verbs,” included “duck,” “grouse,” “hawk,” and “swallow.” This group required players to recognize the dual nature of these words, functioning both as nouns representing avian species and as verbs describing actions. This added a layer of complexity, demanding a more nuanced understanding of language.
The blue category, focused on “TV comedy families,” featured the names “Griffin,” “Munster,” “Partridge,” and “Pickles.” This group caters to fans of television sitcoms, requiring players to identify the surnames associated with famous fictional families. The clue referencing “Brady” as another example provided a strong hint for those familiar with classic television.
The purple category, considered the most challenging, revolved around “words after ‘K’.” The answers, “mart,” “pop,” “street,” and “Swiss,” form common phrases when preceded by the letter “K”: Kmart, K-pop, K Street, and Swiss cheese (often referred to as “Swiss” in short). This category required lateral thinking and a familiarity with these specific terms and their abbreviated forms.
The article emphasizes utilizing available resources, like the NYT Connections Bot, to analyze performance and track progress. Registered users can monitor their statistics, including completion rate, win percentage, perfect scores, and current win streaks. This encourages players to refine their strategies and improve their overall gameplay.
Furthermore, the article offers hints and strategies for tackling Connections puzzles. It suggests breaking down the clues, considering multiple meanings of words, and looking for common threads or patterns. The hints provided for this specific puzzle ranged from simple descriptions of the theme (e.g., “bummed out”) to more cryptic clues requiring interpretation (e.g., “think the 11th letter of the alphabet”). This illustrates the importance of carefully analyzing the hints to unlock the connections between the words. The inclusion of a Wordle cheat sheet further demonstrates the value of understanding word frequency and common letter combinations in word puzzles. This knowledge can be applied to Connections as well, helping players identify potential connections based on the letters within the words themselves. By employing these strategies, players can enhance their ability to quickly and accurately identify the connections between words and solve the puzzle efficiently. The article’s detailed breakdown of the puzzle, combined with its strategic advice, provides a valuable resource for both novice and experienced Connections players.
