NYT Connections hints and answers for Saturday, October 11

Hey there, Connectors! Welcome to the weekend! I hope you’ve got some plans in store.

I don’t know what I’m going to be doing, really! As ever, there’s a mountain of games for me to play and I’ll need to get some work done. I’m hoping to spend some time with my partner above all else, though.

You know, I spend a lot of time sitting at my desk, which is not exactly ideal for my health or trying to get in better shape. One thing I have started, doing, though is setting alarms to go off every 30 minutes during the work day. When it does sound, that’s my cue to get up and walk around the dining table for a couple of minutes, and maybe take care of a quick chore. A tiny step, but it’s obviously a positive one.

Before we begin, we have a great little community on Discord, where we chat about NYT Connections, the rest of the NYT games and all kinds of other stuff. Everyone who has joined has been lovely. It’s a fun hangout spot, and you’re more than welcome to join us.

Discord is also the best way to give me any feedback about the column, especially on the rare (or not-so-rare) occasions that I mess something up. I don’t look at Twitter much.

Today’s NYT Connections hints and answers for Saturday, October 11 are coming right up.

What Are Today’s Connections Hints?

Scroll slowly! Just after the hints for each of today’s Connections groups, I’ll reveal what the groups are without immediately telling you which words go into them.

Today’s 16 words are...

• ALLEY

• SPORT

• TACKLE

• LANE

• TOM

• COURT

• KIT

• BOB

• DON

• BILL

• WEAR

• GEAR

• PAT

• WAY

• PUT ON

• STUFF

The level one hints for today’s Connections groups are:

• 🟨 Yellow group — the right tools for a job (or hobby)

• 🟩 Green group — how one might prepare to impress

• 🟦 Blue group — where we're going, we may not need these anyway

• 🟪 Purple group — sobriquets and polysemy might leave you reaching for a thesaurus

One Word For Each Connections Group

Be warned: we’re really starting to get into spoiler territory.

Let’s take a look at one word for each group.

Today’s Connections word hints are…

• 🟨 Yellow group — STUFF

• 🟩 Green group — SPORT

• 🟦 Blue group — COURT

• 🟪 Purple group — TOM

What Are Today’s Connections Groups?

Need some extra help?

Today’s Connections groups are...

• 🟨 Yellow group — equipment

• 🟩 Green group — dress in

• 🟦 Blue group — street suffixes

• 🟪 Purple group — nicknames that have other meanings

What Are Today’s Connections Answers?

Spoiler alert! Don’t scroll any further down the page until you’re ready to find out today’s Connections answers.

This is your final warning!

Today’s Connections answers are...

• 🟨 Yellow group — equipment (GEAR, KIT, STUFF, TACKLE)

• 🟩 Green group — dress in (DON, PUT ON, SPORT, WEAR)

• 🟦 Blue group — street suffixes (ALLEY, COURT, LANE, WAY)

• 🟪 Purple group — nicknames that have other meanings (BILL, BOB, PAT, TOM)

Hmmm, okay, lots of forenames in the mix here! TOM, BOB, DON, BILL, PAT and LANE. Still, I didn't think it was too bad.

PUT ON and WEAR opened up the greens, while GEAR and STUFF did the same for the yellows.

From there, ALLEY and COURT helped me get the blues (here’s what the hint was referring to).

That left the purples. These were defaults for me. Obviously they're dudes' names, but I didn't realize what else might link them. They're just "nicknames that have other meanings." That's quite nebulous, even for a purple group.

Anyway, my streak now sits at 225 wins in a row. Here's my grid for today:

🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟨🟨🟨🟨
🟦🟦🟦🟦
🟪🟪🟪🟪

That’s all there is to it for today’s Connections clues and answers. Be sure to subscribe to my newsletter for hints and the solution for Sunday’s game if you need them.

P.S. I promise, you do not need to understand anything about video games to enjoy this. It's an incredibly well-edited video from a livestream of Ryan "Northernlion" Letourneau playing The Password Game by Neal Agarwal (whose CAPTCHA-based game, I'm Not a Robot, I wrote about recently).

The Password Game asks you to create a password that abides by a series of increasingly complex and ridiculous rules. You'll need to adjust the password to account for earlier rules that you break while making your text string comply with the new requirements. It’s a lot!

Like Agarwal's other web-based games, this one is funny while having a point to make. It's also frustrating as heck. I typically enjoy watching other people play them more than hopping into them myself — save for this year's Stimulation Clicker.

I've been watching more of Northernlion's streams lately, because he's a fun character who is often quite profound. It took him about two and a half hours to conquer The Password Game and he went through the whole gamut of emotions. This edited version of his playthrough by harryfhumbert is tremendous:

Have a great day! Stay hydrated! Be kind to yourself and each other! Call someone you love!

On weekdays, you can find this column over at Forbes. Please follow my blog there for more coverage of NYT Connections and other word games, and even some video game news, insights and analysis. It helps me out a lot!

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