Inside New York Times Games: Why Killing 96% of New Ideas Is the Win

Zoe Bell is the Executive Producer of Games at The New York Times. If you've played Wordle, Connections, Spelling Bee, Strands, Letter Boxed, the Mini, or the Crossword, you've played something she helped build or bring to life. NYT has nearly 13 million subscribers, which includes the game business that features some ads but no in-app purchases and no battle pass. The players run from your group chat to the Vatican. The Pope has mentioned doing the Wordle in interviews, and Carol Burnett's celebrity Wordle group, including Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Charlize Theron, went on Jimmy Kimmel to accuse her of cheating. Her defense: there's no way to cheat at Wordle, and solving it in one guess is just an accident. Zoe sits down with Jen Donahoe to explain how a newspaper that has run for 175 years became one of the biggest names in games. They get into why the team kills 96% of the games it tries, how a subscription model reshapes the way they design and measure success, and what it takes to launch Crossplay, a full multiplayer layer on games that are fundamentally solo. They also talk about making every puzzle by hand while the rest of the industry automates, and where AI earns a place when human craft is the whole point. For anyone building games, this one is a window into the economics and the discipline behind one of the most envied portfolios in the business. CHAPTERS: 00:00 Welcome and Guest Intro 01:03 From Zynga to Times 03:40 Culture Shock at NYT 05:53 Respecting Game Expertise 07:36 Apps and Platforms 10:13 Subscription Monetization 14:13 Who Plays These Games 18:31 Democratic Game Ideation 21:13 Greenlight to Launch Pipeline 24:36 Testing Markets and Kill Rate 26:00 Killing Prototypes Fast 26:37 Morale With Low Hit Rates 28:43 Testing Before Soft Launch 29:19 KPIs And Portfolio Fit 30:31 UA In Subscription Games 36:46 Streaks And Crossplay Bonds 39:14 AI Human Puzzles First 46:32 What’s Next And Submissions 48:17 Hiring And Tech Stack