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自1913年，现代填字游戏的发明者Arthur Wynne在《纽约世界报》上刊登第一个填字谜题以来，“新闻+游戏”这一模式已经席卷世界各地报纸超过100年了。 作为美国历史最悠久的几家媒体之一，《纽约时报》是这一模式的长期践行者，至今已连续推出数十年填字游戏专栏，其在整个填字游戏圈的地位非常重要。  图源：The New York Times 2016年，《纽约时报》将填字游戏搬到移动平台，又于2021年收购了在Twitter风靡一时的“Wordle”。除了“Wordle”之外，《纽约时报》也在不断推出新的小游戏：有同样经典的“数独（Sudoku）”、结合了连连看和消消乐玩法的上头小游戏“Letter Boxed”，还有考验玩词汇量的拼字游戏“Spelling Bee”。  图源：The
New York Times App截图 值得注意的是，用户上手玩这些游戏无需任何付费或者订阅门槛，但一旦上瘾想要解除部分游戏的每日次数限制（ “Letter
Boxed” 一天一关， “Tiles” 一天两关）或者保存分享游戏记录，便不得不登陆或者订阅《纽约时报》。 在这一模式加持下，游戏服务已成为《纽约时报》人气排行第二的订阅业务，截至2020年年底，《纽约时报》拥有84万游戏订阅用户。该公司声称Wordle推出之后，用户游戏次数已经累积超过5亿，截止2021年年底，该游戏累积吸引超过100万名玩家，而这些都是潜在的订阅用户。他们希望到2025年，其数字订阅用户能增至1000万，并强调将维持此款游戏免费的特性。  图源：http://www./game/200462.html 除此之外，2017年，《澎湃新闻》也在自家网站推出了“澎湃填字”，并很快将其上线到APP平台，用户依旧可以免费玩，但若想参与排名或者分享成绩则需要完成账号的注册和登录。值得一提的是，玩家通过分享填字游戏给新用户就可以获得游戏提示。“澎湃填字”通过这种奖励方式鼓励用户分享此款游戏，从而促进了以现实中熟人社交为基础的高效裂变。  图源：澎湃新闻App 截图 借助各种小游戏对用户的强大吸引力，这种“新闻+游戏”的捆绑模式使得新闻媒体不仅可以培养和强化现有用户的粘性，还可以获得更多的新用户的订阅，增加订阅收入，可谓是一举多得。 你有玩过这些填字小游戏吗？来Newstopia小红书账号评论区和我们分享你的游戏体验吧！ 选题：冯帆洲 作者：冯帆洲
Since the British cruciverbalist
Arthur Wynne published the first crossword puzzle in The New York World in 1913, the “news+games” model has swept across
the journalism industry worldwide for over 100 years. As one of the oldest news agencies
in the United States, The New York Times has been a long-time practitioner of this model, continuously featuring
crossword puzzle columns for decades. In 2016, the crossword game was
launched on its mobile platform, then acquired a popular “Wordle” game on
Twitter (now X) in 2021. In addition to “Wordle”, The New York Times has introduced new games such as the classic
“Sudoku”, a game combining LinkGame and tile-matching video game called “Letter
Boxed”, and a word puzzle game called “Spelling Bee.” Notably, users can play these games
without payment or subscription at first, but if they want to remove daily play
limits on some games (only
one puzzle per day for “Letter Boxed” and two for “Tiles”) or save and share
game records, they are required to log in or subscribe to The New York Times. This model has made game services
the second most popular subscription business for The New York Times, with 840,000 game subscribers by the end of
2020. The company claims that since its launch, “Wordle” has been played more than
500 million times and attracted over one million players by the end of 2021,
all of whom are potential subscribers. They aim to increase their digital
subscription users to 10 million by 2025 and emphasize the intention to keep
this game free. In addition to The New York Times, some Chinese media outlets have also flavored
their platforms with games. In 1999, Southern
Weekly launched the “Xiaoqiang Crossword” column, which was all the rage
soon and became one of the representative crossword games across China. Then,
as fewer people read printed newspapers and more favor reading news on online
mobile platforms, Southern Weekly released a web version of “Xiaoqiang Crossword” in 2009 and a mobile version
was also released later, to adapt to changes in audiences’ reading habits. Similarly, The Paper introduced “Paper Crossword” on their website in 2017,
which was soon expanded to their mobile app. Users can still play for free, but
they need to register and log in to participate in rankings or share their
scores. It is worth mentioning that players can receive hints by sharing the
game with new users. Through this reward system, “Paper Crossword” encourages
users to share game information, promoting efficient viral growth based on
real-world social connections. With the strong appeal of various
mini-games, this “news+games” bundle model not only enhances the engagement of
existing users but also attracts a larger number of new subscribers,
effectively increasing subscription revenue and positively impacting the growth
of news organizations. Have you ever played
one of these crossword games? Share your experiences with us in the
comments section of the Newstopia account of Xiaohongshu! Topic
proposal: Feng Fanzhou Author: Feng Fanzhou 主编（Chief editors）: 冯碧漪 江宇轩 Explore every possibility for better journalism. 小红书、Facebook: Newstopia X: Newstopia_CUHK Instagram: newstopia.cuhk |
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来自： 吕杨鹏 > 《20231016-20231022》
