Folks who fired up the New York Times' daily puzzle Connectionson Monday were greeted with a major surprise. There were emoji where the words should be. This, of course, is a bit of April Fools' Day fun from the NYT's games editors.

Connections usually has 16 words in little tiles. Players place the words into groups of four, hopefully noticing the common characteristic the words have in common. So it was quite the surprise to see emoji first thing on Monday.

Folks online were quick to complain, mostly joking around in exaggerated fashion. It was good fun to see people react to the little twist.

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Other folks online expressed they liked the April Fools puzzle or at least enjoyed the change of pace.

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If the emoji-version of the game is breaking your brain, don't worry, Mashable has hints (and even answers) for you. Not to brag, but I did have a perfect solve myself — just don't ask how long it took.

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Not the day you're after? Here's the solution to today's Connections.