Sudoku Anyone?

Sudoku is a crossword puzzle type game that is all the rage in Britain right now. But will it be a hit here in the United States?

What's Sudoku?

Sudoku is a Japanese brainteaser that is similar to a crossword puzzle but uses numbers instead of letters. The great part about it is that you don't need any mathematical skills to play it. It is based entirely on reasoning and logic.

The game is actually based on a game called Latin Squares, which was developed in the 18th century, who in turn got the idea from an even older Chinese puzzle game called Magic Squares.

How Do You Play?

The name's Japanese translation means, the number that stands alone. The idea of the game is to fill in a grid of nine boxes using the numbers one through nine only once in any given row. The difficult part is that there are nine grids, tied together, resulting in nine separate puzzles that need to be solved correctly in order to fill in the entire grid. You are given a board with several numerals already in place and it's up to you to fill in the rest.

The estimated time that it should take you to solve any given puzzle is from 10 to 30 minutes. But I have to warn you that the game can become extremely addicting. British newspapers are publishing puzzles daily and the people there just can't seem to get enough of it. There are also computerized versions of Sudoku.

Play Online

Upon learning of this new craze, I checked it out online. There are several web-sites dedicated to the game. At www.sudoku.com, You can learn more about how to play and solve the puzzles and download a free trial version of the game. If you enjoy it, you can purchase it there for $14.95.

If you enjoy puzzles, check out Sudoku. I think you'll be glad you did. Unless of course, you find yourself addicted like I did. Don't say you weren't warned!