NEW ‘Connections’ hints and answers for Thursday 19 December

On By Littum

Looking for Wednesday connections tips and answers instead? You can find them here:

ForbesNEW ‘Connections’ hints and answers for Wednesday 18 DecemberBy Chris Holt

Hey guys! I hope you have an excellent week.

The weather has been strangely mild in my neck of the woods this week, so I’ve been taking advantage of that by getting out for a walk or two. I mean, when the temperatures drop below -15C (5F) I won’t be going outside again until April.

Before we get started, I’ve started a discussion group for Connections and this column on Discord. You can chat about each game (and other topics) with me and other people. I’m always interested in finding out how other people approach the game, so join in! It’s funny.

It’s also the best way to give me feedback on the column, especially on the rare(!) occasions when I mess up.

Today’s NEW Connections advice and answers for Thursday 19 December will come straight up.

How Connections plays

Connections is a free, popular New York Times daily word game. You get a new puzzle at midnight every day. You can play on NEW website or game app.

You are presented with a grid of 16 words. Your task is to arrange them into four groups of four by finding out the connections between them. The groups can be things like clickable items, names of research study participants, or words with a body part in front.

There is only one solution to each puzzle and you have to be careful when it comes to words that can fit into more than one category. You can mix up the words to perhaps help you see connections between them.

Each group is color coded. The yellow group is usually the easiest to figure out, blue and green fall in the middle, and the purple group is usually the hardest. The purple group often involves puns.

Choose four words that you think fit together and press send. If you guess and you’re wrong, you lose a life. If you’re close to having a correct group, you may see a message telling you that you’re one word away from getting it right, but you still need to figure out which one to swap.

If you make four mistakes, it’s game over. Let’s make sure that doesn’t happen with some tips and if you’re really struggling, today’s is Connections answer. As with Wordle and other similar games, it’s easy to share results with your friends on social media and group chat.

If you have one NEW Free access or Spil subscription, you can access the publication’s Connections file. This includes all previous games of Connectionsso you can go back and play any of them you missed.

Apart from the first 60 games or so, you should be able to find my tips for each grid via Google if you need them! Just click here and add the date of the game for which you need clues or the answers to the search query.

What’s today’s hookup tip?

Roll slowly! Right after the hints for each of today’s Connections groups, I will reveal what the groups are without immediately telling you what words are included in them.

Today’s 16 words are…

  • LOSS
  • THUG
  • KEG
  • BARREL
  • TABLE
  • SUB
  • BARGE
  • HAMMER
  • COUNTER
  • LADDER
  • GORILLA
  • SHELF
  • RUSK
  • DELAY
  • CREATED
  • POSTPONE

And hints for today Connections groups are:

  • Yellow group — push back
  • Green group — seen in a place where everyone knows your name (dun dun dun)
  • Blue group — all at sea
  • Purple Group — a certain Italian plumber appears here for the first time as you try to save Pauline from an angry opponent

What are today’s connection groups?

Do you need extra help?

Be warned: we’re starting to come in spoiler territory.

Today’s Connections groups are…

  • Yellow group — postpone
  • Green group — bare inventory
  • Blue group — watercraft
  • Purple group — seen in Donkey Kong

What are today’s connections answers?

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

This is your last warning!

Today’s Connections the answers are…

  • Yellow Group — Postpone (DELAY, POSTPONED, SHELF, TABLE)
  • Green Group — Bar Fixtures (Counter, Barrel, CABINET, TAP)
  • Blue group — watercraft (BARGE, JUNK, SUB, TUG)
  • Purple group — seen in Donkey Kong (BARREL, GORILLA, HAMMER, LADDER)

My five-day streak is over. Here’s how I managed:

I’m so mad at myself for messing this up.

My first thought was that there was a group of boats involving BARGE, TUG and JUNK, but I couldn’t see a fourth word for them. I switched when I saw the yellows as they were pretty obvious.

I then made a stupid mistake with a guess at TAP, KEG, BARREL and HAMMER. Nothing to do there, and it was a (kind of) bad move since there was a bunch of beer-related words yesterday.

Then a much more careless mistake. I somehow held three of those words together? TAP, BARGE, HAMMER and BARREL could have been verbs to make aggressive physical contact with someone. But not this time.

I then got a face handle as SUB screamed at me to complete the blues. Sigh.

I was pretty stunned at the time. COUNTER, LADDER, GORILLA and HAMMER put me one away from a group, but I was down to my last life. I was still clueless. I took a wild guess by swapping LADDER for TAP, but no luck.

I was so very close to getting the greens! I’m annoyed that I didn’t get them. Even more so I didn’t get the purple ones. GORILLA should have been the glaring clue there.

Mentioning Mario in the clue might have made the group a little too obvious, I bet. Mario was known as Jumpman when he made his debut in the 1981s Donkey Kong.

That’s all there is to it for today Connections clues and answers. Be sure to check my blog tomorrow for tips and the fix for Friday’s match if you need them.

PS There is only one possible option for today’s recommendation. It should be The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters. This is a great documentary about a battle for the high score in Donkey Kong. It’s funny, dramatic and very entertaining. It’s currently on Prime Video in the US:

Have a nice day! Call someone you love!

If you are so inclined, go for it follow my blog for more coverage of Connections and other puns and even some video game news, insights and analysis. It helps me a lot! Also follow me further Blue sky! It’s fun there.