I’ve not played it yet, but knowing how I’ll lose years of my life to the moronic game on my cell phone, I understand the appeal. The BBC has a story today about the Su Doku craze that’s reportedly taking Britian newspaper readers by storm:
To be pure Su Doku each of the unique puzzles – which come in varying levels of difficulty – must have only one solution. The aim? To fill in the grid so that every row, every column, and every box contains the digits one to nine.
This simple game has spawned a complex industry, according to the man who brought Su Doku to the UK via the Times newspaper. Plans are afoot to add the game to mobile phones, and a board game and television show could soon leap on the bandwagon.
The internet is awash with chat about Su Doku and programers are tapping away to find the best system for solving the puzzles.
‘Engrossed’
"I know if I’ve got a busy day ahead I won’t even look at a difficult one, because once you are hooked into it you have to keep going," says Peter Levell, who keeps his playing to about three times a week.
If you’re not the obsessive (or sporting) type, you might be interested one of the Su Doku solvers out there. If you get hooked on the real thing though, you can get your fix at the London Times Games website.
Just what I needed…another time-consuming distraction.
Bejeweled is so 2002.
Fads are weird. Games Magazine has had this puzzle for like 20 years.
Games Magazine has had this puzzle for like 20 years.
I was going to point that out as well. The version I remember encountering first also required the diagonals to have the whole set and used a 9-letter word (with 9 unique letters, natch) instead of digits. Wonder how long it’s been around.
Speaking of Games Magazine and fads, remember the Equation Analysis Test?
Games Magazine has had this puzzle for like 20 years.
ehh…what’s that sonny? You’re gonna have to speak up, I’m deaf in this one ear… ;p
ehh…what’s that sonny? You’re gonna have to speak up, I’m deaf in this one ear… ;p
Must be like that new fangled Pong thing the kids are talking about…
Dell puzzle mags have had this one for years, too. Sometimes numbers, sometimes letters, sometimes both.
Everytime I see something like this, I have to fight the temptation to whip up a solver for it. Computers do this stuff so much better than we do.