So Wordle has taken the world by storm and you have probably played it. It’s a fun game word guessing game which is the beautiful baby borne out from the 70’s game Mastermind and the old logic word game Jotto.

Daddy Jotto and Mummy Mastermind gives you a beautiful bouncy Wordle!

If you are worried about Wordle being bought by the New York Times and want to play something similar, there already are many articles that share similar online word guessing games. Here’s one good article and here’s another.

If you rather play something more analog or prefer a tactile feel to your games, here’s our recommendations for a Wordle replacement. These games are arranged from simple to a more strategic word game:

Bananagrams

Banangrams is a simple word tiling game where everyone simultaneously races to arrange their own intersecting word grid. The first to use the most letters in the shortest time wins. But with word tiles, you can create your own word game, and you are not limited to 5 letter words!

Codenames

This is one of the most popular card games out now but it is not a word guessing game but rather a word association game. Codenames is a team-based game where a 5 x 5 grid of randomly selected words will be placed for team members to choose. The first team to choose all the right words win. Doesn’t sound too complicated except that the member giving out clues can give clues of several words if they are closely related so as to find all the words quicker (e.g. people 3 - referring to 3 word clues relating to people). One of the words on the grid is an “Assassin” and if chosen, that team will immediately lose. It's intelligent without being smug, just complicated enough to allow strategy without being bogged down and best of all guaranteed to bring out the laughs.

Paperback

At its core, Paperback follows the classic deck-builder formula; each turn, you draw a hand of five cards from your personal deck and use them to buy better cards from a common deck. Where Paperback deviates from this is that your cards are only worth anything if you can spell out a word with them. Each card has one or two letters on them, while each deck starts with five valueless wild cards that can be used as any letter to facilitate your wordsmanship. Using these, you’ll gradually improve your deck as you fill it with more expensive letters that will then net you more and more money on future turns. The ultimate goal is to earn the most Victory Points. This is a tantalizing premise for anyone that enjoys a good strategic word game.

Paperback is probably the thinkiest game out of the 3 but this clever little card game is so much more than the sum of its parts. Not only is it delightfully illustrated and organised, but it’s also an excellent introduction to deck-building mechanics for newcomers to modern board games. So if you want to scratch that Wordle itch, check out these games that you can play competitively or cooperatively with multiple people.