Sometimes, I feel like one of the only people in my family that doesn’t play Wordle. My parents, sister and even my fiance have a Wordle group text thread to compare their daily scores. The massively popular word game created by Josh Wardle was eventually acquired by the New York Times. I don’t religiously solve Wordle puzzles each day, but I do play several movie-related games.
Whether you’re a Wordle devotee looking to branch out or a cinephile seeking to put your celluloid knowledge to the test, you’ve got multiple options. From guessing the movie title based on stills or figuring out the plot based on plot words to bridging the gap between actors based on filmography, there’s a lot of variety. Here are the Wordle-esque film-focused games that I play every day.
Framed
With Framed, you get a movie still and have to guess the title based on the image. You’ve got six tries -- with each successive wrong guess, you’ll get a new scene. Even if you haven’t seen the film, you can sometimes guess correctly using context clues. For instance, on a recent Framed puzzle, I eventually landed on the right movie (Hairspray), which I hadn’t seen, purely by correctly identifying that it was a John Waters film. In a proud moment, I recognized Unbreakable from the first picture.
You can play Framed in a web browser on your computer or mobile device. There’s a new Framed puzzle daily.
Hollywoodle
Hollywoodle presents two actors you need to connect through movies using the fewest guesses possible. The instructions aptly describe it as adjacent to Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon. Here’s an example of my process linking Alexandra Daddario with Ritu Arya recently:
Alexandra Daddario ➡️ San Andreas (2015) ➡️ Paul Giamatti ➡️ Planet of the Apes (2001) ➡️ Mark Wahlberg ➡️ The Other Guys (2010) ➡️ Will Ferrell ➡️ Barbie (2023) ➡️ Ritu Arya
It’s a fun puzzle that makes you get out the metaphorical corkboard, string, thumbtacks and pictures to create your own movie-themed mystery board. New Hollywoodle games come out every day, and you can play for free in a browser on your mobile device or PC.
Plotwords
Plotwords provides you with different keywords, and you guess the film based on those clues. There are two ways to play: a daily challenge that throws one movie at you, or an unlimited version. The daily challenge gives you up to 27 clues, with new information for each subsequent incorrect guess. The unlimited version offers all hints upfront, including the release date, and it's similar to Hangman. You’ll start with five lives, and you lose a life for each wrong guess or skip.
Hints can be pretty sparse, like “detective,” or more specific, such as “father-daughter relationship.” The final hint is usually the release date, such as 2016-05-15 -- the day The Nice Guys came out. (I eventually landed on this in a recent rousing match of Plotwords, but nearly expired all my guesses. I was initially sure it was the 1979 George C. Scott vehicle Hardcore.)
Plotwords is available to play in a browser on mobile devices and PCs.
Gaps
Gaps gives you six guesses to name the movie, and you know the number of words and letters in the title from the onset. You’ll also start out with basic information, including the runtime and genre. You can guess or skip, and with each skip or incorrect entry, you get an additional tip, like the release date, director, cast and plot-related keywords.
On a recent Gaps game, the answer was Million Dollar Baby. I didn’t guess correctly until the director clue, which was Clint Eastwood. I successfully got The Sixth Sense on the second attempt after seeing the release date, without even getting to the director hint. Coupled with my recognition of Unbreakable on the first image in a recent bout of Framed, I’m surprised by my M. Night Shyamalan expertise.
You get a new Gaps puzzle daily, and can play in a web browser on your phone, tablet or computer.
Faces
AI image generators are seemingly everywhere, including online games. Faces uses artificial intelligence to combine the faces of two actors. You start out guessing either the first or second person, and have five attempts apiece, so 10 total. Initially, you’re armed with each person’s gender along with the portrait of their fused faces. Then, information like birth date, films they’re known for and initials get filled in for each skip or wrong answer.
You get a new Faces game each day and can join the fun in a browser on your computer, phone or tablet.
ScreenIdle
With ScreenIdle, you get a trio of games: guess the movie poster, name that tagline and movie blank buster (which is essentially hangman).
The movie poster game gives you a pixelated film poster and you get six guesses. After each subsequent wrong answer, the blocky box art becomes a little clearer. In recent matches, I got The Bourne Identity in four guesses and L.A. Confidential in five.
ScreenIdle's movie tagline game throws you a tagline along with the year of the flick. You get six guesses. I got Dr. No on the first try but missed The Sixth Sense entirely (I was certain this was another 1999 release like The Thirteenth Floor, Stigmata or Dogma, but alas).
Movie title blank buster provides a film title in, well, blanks, so you know the number of words and letters. Each correctly predicted letter gets filled in, and you get six wrong guesses -- so you could go an entire game without losing a heart (which indicates your guesses). While playing, I got Lost in Translation with two lost hearts, and Donnie Darko with four incorrect letter answers. There are some neat tricks you can use to make things easier. For instance, while guessing Lost in Translation, I initially focused on two-letter words ("of," "in," "an," "or") to narrow things down.
There are new ScreenIdle movie poster, movie tagline and blank buster games each day; you can test your film knowledge in a web browser on your computer, phone or tablet.
MovieQuest
If you love Wordle and movies, you'll love MovieQuest. It's a movie guessing game with two options: unlimited and daily. When you guess a movie, you'll see lots of information, including the title, director, release year, genre, cast, runtime, rating and box office performance. Any correct information from those fields is in green, while incorrect data is in red. I started with The Big Lebowski as a feeder guess, and "crime" was in green for the genre. Next, I tried the 2010 flick The Town starring Ben Affleck, which just so happened to be the right answer -- I got it in two.
Aside from the daily game, you can play an unlimited match that keeps giving you quizzes. You can use the Show Hints button to reveal information from any of the fields, but you lose anywhere from 15 to 200 points depending on which one you uncover.
There's a new daily quiz each day, or you can play unlimited; MovieQuest is available in a web browser on your computer or mobile devie.
Cine2Nerdle
With Cine2Nerdle, you've got three Wordle-eqsue movie games: original, reversal and logic.
With original, you've got between four and five movies, and you need to line up the tiles with all of the right information. This could include actors, movie studios, genres, plot points, characters and any number of different elements. You get 15 tile swaps to find the five different movies.
With reversal, you've got a series of movies and need to group them by their common theme. In a recent match of Cine2Nerdle, the themes were director, character, cast member and punctuation in the title. There can be overlap in themes. You have 15 tile swaps to correctly group the movies into their five themes.
In logical, you're given rules to follow, like lining up characters in certain spots, organizing films into spaces by release date, lining up all actors into certain rows or meeting other requirements. Of the three, logic may be my favorite, but I enjoy all three variations of this Wordle-like puzzle game. You can swap tiles as much as you like, but you only get to check your logic five times using the aptly named Check Logic button.
If you really know your cinema, you can try battles by playing against other users. You can enter a ranked game for a true challenge, hop into a casual match for less pressure or go head-to-head with friends and family.
You can play new Cine2Nerdle games daily. Puzzles are playable in a browser on computers and mobile devices.
Episode
For a quiz of your small screen knowledge, Episode shows you an image from a TV show. You get nine guesses before the answer is revealed. I do enjoy television, but my TV knowledge isn’t as robust as my cinema expertise (currently, I’m watching The West Wing, which aired from 1999 to 2006, for the first time, so I’m a little behind). I still have a lot of fun with this pop culture game, even if my batting average isn’t as solid as my record in its movie-focused sibling, Framed.
There are new Episode games once per week, and you can play in a web browser on your mobile device or PC.
After you’ve tested your movie mettle, you can try these Wordle-like puzzle games, and learn everything there is to know about Wordle.