In March, TechCrunch reported that LinkedIn was experimenting with adding games to its platform, including word and logic puzzles like Wordle. Now, to draw more users and boost activity, the platform has officially released three of these games.
Starting today, Queens, Crossclimb, and Pinpoint are available worldwide. These games test logic, trivia, and word association skills. You can access them through a direct link or via LinkedIn News, which created the games.
Like Wordle, you can play each of these games only once per day. Currently, you can ask your first-degree connections to join a game with you. If you choose, you can also share your game status — including whether you played and your results — with these connections.
These social features and the total number of games are still being debated, so changes may occur in the future. Currently, LinkedIn intends to keep creating the games on its own, separate from Microsoft and its major gaming business.
LinkedIn views these games as a relaxed method to strengthen the bonds between existing connections on the platform.
“It is hard for people to stay in touch with each other, and games provide a way to build these network ties,” said Dan Roth, the VP and editor in chief of LinkedIn News, in an interview.
There’s more to this story, too. The games were created by LinkedIn’s News team and are heavily influenced by the kind of games that newspapers like The New York Times have introduced.
This includes various word and logic puzzles, beginning with crosswords and expanding to more diverse puzzles. While many of these were developed in-house, some, such as the well-known Wordle, were acquired by the NYT in 2022.
Games have also turned out to be an effective tool for increasing engagement, particularly when news publishers are urgently trying to determine the future of their businesses. Meanwhile, platforms like TikTok and Instagram are attracting younger audiences.
Puzzles released by newspapers and magazines draw in millions of users. These users often become part of the broader audience and may start reading other content from these publications.
Similarly, LinkedIn, which has over 1 billion users, has been enhancing its news and content services to boost user engagement.
Like newspapers, it also relies heavily on advertising and offers premium features behind paywalls for interested users. Adding games helps increase user engagement, which can enhance its advertising reach and offer more value to its users.
Queens is similar to Sudoku, where you need to place crowns in patterns without overlapping within a time limit. From the screenshot, it’s clear that you can share your scores with people, and your company name is displayed on a leaderboard.
I questioned whether this might be an issue or distraction, considering some workplaces restrict social media use. Laura Lorenzetti, LinkedIn’s executive editor for North America, explained that the restriction of one game per day and the brief duration of the games should address these concerns.
“They are contained and they’re intended to be contained, because we don’t want people wasting their time,” she said. “That is not what we’re here for!”
Crossclimb is a trivia game where players are given word clues. These words must fit into a grid and change by one letter after each clue to eventually become a different word.
I discovered this game is more challenging than it seems if you don’t guess the first word correctly. Another player mentioned it was her favorite. Like with Queens, there is also a company leaderboard in this game.
Finally, there’s Pinpoint, which is very similar to the New York Times game Connections. I often mistakenly referred to it as “Connections” during my interview. In this game, you need to find a link between words that aren’t initially shown, and you try to discover this connection with as few hints as possible. I also found it quite hard in my initial tries.
As mentioned before, LinkedIn isn’t the only social network to integrate gaming to keep users more engaged. However, even the largest and most costly initiatives have had varying success. Facebook, the largest social network, has been a key player in social gaming, but it closed its separate gaming app in 2022 due to decreased usage. Now, it is concentrating more on mixed reality experiences and its Meta Quest business.
LinkedIn, which is focused on professional networking and specifically on job searching and recruitment, has always looked for ways to encourage users to interact more naturally and less formally on its platform.
Games are naturally interactive, but the interactions come through playing games. If LinkedIn can engage users with these games, it hopes they might spend more time on the platform.
What we think?
I think LinkedIn’s new games will attract more people to use the platform often. Games like Queens, Cross climb, and Pinpoint seem fun and could help people connect more with their friends at work.
Some people might find games distracting, but playing once a day is a good limit. It could make LinkedIn more interesting, especially for younger users who like quick and interactive activities. This could really help LinkedIn grow.
