Here is a comprehensive summary of the Wikipedia article on NYT Games:

NYT Games is the digital puzzle collection from The New York Times, which began with its iconic crossword in 1942 and was officially branded as a service in 2014 with the launch of the Mini Crossword. As print sales have declined, the service has become a major revenue driver, amassing over 10 million daily players and more than one million premium subscribers by 2024, leading to the internal joke that the Times is "a gaming company that also happens to offer news." Its viral success exploded in January 2022 when the company acquired the popular word game Wordle from creator Josh Wardle, which was later integrated into the NYT Games app alongside other hits like Spelling Bee and Connections. To reflect its expanding roster beyond just crosswords, the app was renamed from "NYT Crosswords" to "NYT Games" in March 2023, though not every experiment succeeded (the number game Digits was shut down later that year). Today, the games are a central part of the newspaper's digital subscription strategy, offering daily puzzles that mirror its news cadence.