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alfvaenOne of the things I got for Christmas was a couple of Sudoku books, one of which was half Kakuro as well. I also got Nicole a couple of such books, including one with "Godoku", which is just Sudoku with letters instead of numbers, and some 4x4 Sudoku.
I can't help being bemused by the whole Sudoku fad. I've been doing puzzles for years, ever since I as a kid, off and on. I've also long been bemused by the fact that every puzzle book publisher has to call them something else, which I always presumed was because of some silly trademark laws or something. So my favourite puzzles as a kid were Skeletons or Frameworks, or sometimes even Fill-Ins, though those tended to be denser and more crosswordlike.
I think it was somewhere in my teens that I became fond of Cross Sums (as at least one publisher called them). These are the puzzles now known as Kakuro, but I still call them Cross Sums. As opposed to Sudoku, which, while I recall seeing them in puzzle books before I ever heard the term Sudoku, didn't have a name that I was nearly as attached to. In fact, I can't recall what their old name might have been. ("Number Place", maybe?)
I'm working my way fairly steadily through the Kakuro/Sudoku book; I've still got a way to go, but so far they're not too challenging. I've even learned a few Kakuro techniques that I hadn't used before, but these puzzles are still pretty simple. I don't like Sudoku nearly as much, but it's okay. I foresee that when I run out of the book with Kakuro in it, I'll go much more slowly through the other one. Or if they start to get too frustrating.
I can't help being bemused by the whole Sudoku fad. I've been doing puzzles for years, ever since I as a kid, off and on. I've also long been bemused by the fact that every puzzle book publisher has to call them something else, which I always presumed was because of some silly trademark laws or something. So my favourite puzzles as a kid were Skeletons or Frameworks, or sometimes even Fill-Ins, though those tended to be denser and more crosswordlike.
I think it was somewhere in my teens that I became fond of Cross Sums (as at least one publisher called them). These are the puzzles now known as Kakuro, but I still call them Cross Sums. As opposed to Sudoku, which, while I recall seeing them in puzzle books before I ever heard the term Sudoku, didn't have a name that I was nearly as attached to. In fact, I can't recall what their old name might have been. ("Number Place", maybe?)
I'm working my way fairly steadily through the Kakuro/Sudoku book; I've still got a way to go, but so far they're not too challenging. I've even learned a few Kakuro techniques that I hadn't used before, but these puzzles are still pretty simple. I don't like Sudoku nearly as much, but it's okay. I foresee that when I run out of the book with Kakuro in it, I'll go much more slowly through the other one. Or if they start to get too frustrating.
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Date: 2007-01-24 03:59 am (UTC)The magazine of Sudoku puzzles I use to pick up in Japan was actually called "Number Place" (in katakana, that is), so there may have been some cross-pollination, idea-wise.
I'm a sudoku junkie, but I usually only do it these days to kill time. I find it's helpful in bringing my brain to a kind of alpha-wave state so I can better focus on other things, like programming. Meditative, repetitive sudoku: my anti-drug.