about 2 months ago - No comments
Killer Plus Minus Samurai puzzle
If you’re a Sudoku Xtra reader you’ll have seen these in their regular 9×9 form in both issues 5 and 6, but this is the first time I’ve made a Samurai one, and the first time I’ve posted one here I think.
This is essentially a regular Killer Sudoku puzzle, except that More >
about 3 months ago - No comments
Killer Sudoku Pro 6×6 Samurai puzzle
It’s been quiet here recently – much of my effort has been going on my UK General Election site, How To Vote, although Sudoku Xtra 6 was out on Saturday too. Anyway, there are still 10 days to go to the election but after that I’ll get some time back!
However I thought I should More >
about 4 months ago - 1 comment
Samurai 3-grid Calcudoku 6×6 puzzle
I’ve been posting a few new varieties of Sudoku puzzle in the daily puzzle section of PuzzleMix (i.e. the subscription section, which costs less than £1 a month for well over 1,000 puzzles a year). These aren’t especially unusual variations, but I’ve done a few different mixes (e.g. Sudoku-X 12×12 and More >
about 4 months ago - 3 comments
Toroidal Killer Jigsaw Toroidal puzzle
A while back someone asked for some variant toroidal patterns on PuzzleMix, so I was just adding a couple of them to the daily puzzles section when it occurred to me that I could put up a few toroidal killer sudoku too, for a change. However I then realised that the More >
about 4 months ago - 1 comment
Samurai Star XXXXX puzzle
I haven’t posted a puzzle for a week (it’s been a busy week, mind!) so it’s time to make up for that, just in time for the weekend.
In this puzzle the aim is pretty simple: place 1 to 9 in each set of 9 squares starting and ending with a bold line, More >
about 4 months ago - 2 comments
I wrote quite a lot yesterday about whether you “needed” the X in some Sudoku-X puzzles. I promised that I’d follow up with the result of analysing a stack of Killer Sudoku-X puzzles, and so here is that result.
I picked 64 Killer Sudoku-X puzzles (52 for the daily puzzlemix section plus 12 for the weekly More >
about 4 months ago - 3 comments
One of the perennial comments on PuzzleMix is that the diagonal ‘X’ regions aren’t needed in a particular Sudoku-X puzzle, or more commonly in Killer Sudoku X. Well, when I say “perennial” I mean to say that of the more than 400,000 puzzle plays that that comment has been made about 10 times. But an More >
about 4 months ago - 1 comment
Killer Sudoku Jigsaw puzzle
I’ve recently been working on refreshing the content for PuzzleMix.com, my play-online puzzle site, and one of the puzzle types I’ve been making is Killer Jigsaw Sudoku, where you not only have the jigsaw-shaped Killer regions but also jigsaw shapes instead of the regular 3×3 Sudoku boxes.
So I thought it would be a More >
about 5 months ago - 2 comments
Samurai-2 Odd Pair Sudoku puzzle
One of the brand new puzzles in Sudoku Xtra issue 4 is Odd-Pair Sudoku, which I wrote about last week here on my puzzle blog. As well as some regular 9×9 puzzles I also included a large 5-grid Odd-Pair Samurai puzzle, and to illustrate how the puzzle worked I included a More >
about 5 months ago - 3 comments
Samurai 8-grid Calcudoku puzzle
Here’s probably the largest Calcudoku puzzle you’ve ever seen! It’s made up of 8 underlying 9×9 grids, each of which must have 1 to 9 placed into each row and column, and then on top of this I’ve added the familiar Calcudoku regions.
For each Calcudoku region just place numbers such that the More >
about 1 year ago
With the samurai sky scraper do the numbers around the edge apply to a row of twelve(where applicable) or only the first nine in a given direction?
about 1 year ago
Hi Ricky, I am almost certain you treat the puzzle as two overlapping 9 x 9 grids and therefore the skycraper numbers would only go up to 9 (even in a row of 12 because the last 3 boxes are not part of that particular 9 x 9 grid, if that makes sense!) I hope that’s correct. I am new to skycraper puzzles and am working on this one too!
about 1 year ago
It doesn’t actually matter whether the skyscraper clues refer to the entire width/height of the puzzle or just the first grid encountered, which is why I didn’t mention this.
Because the first 9 squares are guaranteed to contain a ‘9′ at some point, and nothing past that square can possibly be higher than a ‘9′, then the skyscraper clues will be the same whether you count 12 squares (where possible) or just 9 squares every time.
Hope this helps!
about 1 year ago
I still haven’t managed to solve this one yet! I’ve got near to completion twice, but then realised I’ve gone wrong! Is it significanlty harder because of the overlapping grids which means you don’t get clues at either side of the 9×9 grids (if that makes sense) or is it just me?
about 1 year ago
I completed this one a while back. Something that might help is where you have the 12 length rows and columns, the first 3 digits will match the last 3 digits (they might not be in the same order).
As an example: If you are lucky enough to deduce a 9 in one of these areas, then you know another 9 must exist in the set of 3 at the opposite end.
about 1 year ago
I was aware of that strategy, but am still getting a bit stuck with this one. I find it relatively easy to place the 9s, 8s and even the 7s, it is the lower numbers which cause the problem! Anyway, nice to hear that someone has managed it Spittledung! I’m not prepared to give in yet so will give it one last try!
about 1 year ago
If you’d like a copy of the solution, just let me know!
You’re right that there are far less Skyscraper clues than in other puzzles I’ve published. Interestingly, a common thing to do in general (which I haven’t done yet) is to remove lots of the Skyscraper clues from a puzzle, just like removing givens from the Sudoku part – maybe I won’t try making puzzles like that as a top priority then.
about 1 year ago
I’m making a habit of this, but yes please! I always enjoy getting to grips with a new type of puzzle but am needing more practise with these! Thanks. I hate it when a puzzle gets the better of me!
about 1 year ago
Great post! Just wanted to let you know you have a new subscriber- me!