Today's Connections Hints & Answers For December 28, 2024 (Puzzle #566)

If you want to finish up today’s Connections puzzle all easy-peasy, then you are going to want a few hints to get it done. There are some tricky components to the puzzle, and some of the category criteria feel like they sometimes cross over to make things even more confusing. However, with a little bit of detective work and a little bit of persistence, you should be able to win the day and take home the victory.

If you want to play a different puzzle, my personal favorite from the NYT is The Strands. It is a word search puzzle but with the caveat that you have no idea what the words might be. Additionally, it can be a phrase instead of a word, so you might have found the right word without the attachment that makes it the correct phrase. The good news is with every word you find that isn’t in the puzzle, you start to collect clues that will point you in the right direction, rewarding you for taking chances in the game.

Today's Connections Category Hints

DECEMBER 28 #566

If you want some hints for today’s puzzle, you are in the right place. There are plenty of different clues if you know where to look, but this puzzle is going to be harder to solve without the specialized knowledge than it was yesterday. I find that unfortunate, as I liked being able to solve the puzzle with just the clues present in the puzzle. That being said, here are four clues to help you decipher the puzzle:

• One category is about the difficulty level of any given thing when asked about it
• One category is about things you might find in a certain collection of stories
• One category is about things that you might interact with but only in a metaphorical sense
• One category is about four words that all start with a similar smaller word at the beginning

Getting to the final answers in this puzzle might require a few more clues. You can get them by looking at the various category names and the spoilers below.

Today's Connections Answers

DECEMBER 28 #566

Yellow Answers: Revealed & Explained

This one stood out fairly quickly to me, but I still didn’t get it fully right the first time. Seeing EASY and NO SWEAT was what gave the category away, and it didn’t take long before I spotted SURE THING. However, CAN was a red herring here and ITSY was as well to a smaller extent. Once I did see PIECE OF CAKE it was a sure thing to finish off this category like it wasn’t hard at all.

Green Answers: Revealed & Explained

As a Classic’s major, these kinds of categories are always both easy and a little frustrating. Three of these things were pretty easy to put together as things that appeared in Greek myths. The APPLE OF DISCORD is sort of a thing, but not named as such in the myth it appears. It’s just another reminder of how much the Romans ruined Greek myths and my Roman Empire is thinking about how much the Romans ruined, which is unfortunate for me specifically.

Blue Answers: Revealed & Explained

This one was hard, as it’s been a long time since I’ve heard some of these metaphors and I don’t use them much myself. Maybe I’ll just start telling many people to kick various things and see how it goes. Spreading discord is after all my new favorite thing and this seems harmless enough. Kick the apple has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?

Purple Answers: Revealed & Explained

This one will be hard to spot if you are not looking for it. HISTAMINE could be accidentally placed in the Greek category, and I originally wanted MINEFIELD to go with HORNET’S NEST as things that could sting you. However, noticing that they all start with personal possessive pronouns might be harder. In fact, I thought a possessive might be one of the categories but was looking at the actual words with apostrophes rather than the right words to go here. With luck, however, you can get the rest and move to this category last and win the day.

Other Games Like Connections

When you have finished up this puzzle, there are plenty more for you to solve in the box below. One of my favorites is Crosswordle, which combines a couple of different puzzles into one.