Wordle gets acquired by The New York Times, will 'initially' remain free-to-play

Smash online word game Wordle has just been bought from its creator Josh Wardle by The New York Times. The publication bought it for "an undisclosed price in the low seven figures," It will "initially remain free to new and existing players" once it moves over to NYT's site. Wardle said he is working with the company to preserve players' existing wins and streak data once the game migrates to its new home. 

As The Verge pointed out, NYT's announcement leaves plenty of room for the company to put Wordle behind its paywall. Wardle explains it has "been a little overwhelming" running the hugely popular game, given he's the one running it on his own. Wardle created Wordle as a gift to his partner, Palak Shah, after they got hooked on word games (like NYT's Spelling Bee and crosswords) during the pandemic. It was publicly released in late 2020 but has blown up in the last few months, partly due to the viral, emoji-based messages that let players share how they did on the daily puzzle without revealing the word of the day.

'NHL 22' introduces women's teams for the first time

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Ahead of the Winter Olympics, EA has finally introduced women's teams to its NHL games for the first time. You can pick one of 10 women's International Ice Hockey Federation national squads in NHL 22. You can pick teams from Canada, the Czech Republic (Czechia), Denmark, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Japan, Russia, Switzerland, and the USA.

NHL 22 also gets IIHF Men's World and Juniors teams. Aside from competing in IIHF World Championship tournaments, the Men's and Women's teams are playable in the Play Now, Online Versus, Threes Now, and Offline/Online Shootouts modes.

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iOS 15.4's 'Use Face ID with a Mask' feature only works on iPhone 12 and newer devices

The recently launched iOS 15.4 update comes with a rather useful feature. It lets you unlock the phone with its Face ID when wearing a mask. According to Apple, it scans the "unique features around the eye area." But it looks like the feature requires more resources, as the company seems to be limiting its availability to newer iPhone and iPad models.

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Ubisoft to shutter 'Hyper Scape' on Apr. 28

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Ubisoft is discontinuing the development of its battle royale game Hyper Scape. On Thursday, the company announced that it would shut down the title on April 28. Hyper Scape was launched in the summer of 2020 with the promise of bringing fresh ideas to the crowded battle royale space. However, it struggled to garner attention from gamers. The developer tried to introduce additional content to the game to get players on board, but it didn't work out.

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