What makes a good connection puzzle?

A connection should be a fact you could look up: a film role, a collaboration, a sponsorship, a historic moment. Vague associations and gossip make a puzzle feel arbitrary. In CHAINED every link on a Daily's official route has a source, and you can read why it holds once you finish the chain.

If one card is obviously right, there is no puzzle. If none of them lead anywhere, there is no game. Good puzzles offer several plausible options and no dead ends: every card you are shown can still reach the goal within the moves you have left.

Long chains are tiring; surprising ones are memorable. The best chains are short but cross worlds you would not expect to meet — sport to music, history to film. The last chain of each CHAINED Daily is chosen for exactly that kind of jump.

A daily puzzle is played again and again, so repetition shows quickly. The same famous name as the goal three days running, or every route passing through the same giant brand, makes a game feel smaller than it is. Each CHAINED Daily spans several worlds — music, film, sport, fashion, history, places — and we space out repeated names and hubs across the week.

The payoff of a connection puzzle is the moment you see the link and think: I had no idea. That is why CHAINED shows a short, sourced explanation after each chain and a few “Today you learned” facts at the end of the Daily. Try today's chains or read how to play.