Sujiken® is a new puzzle based on the wildly popular Sudoku puzzle. A Sujiken puzzle is constructed from 45 cells placed in a right-triangle as shown above. Some cells already contain a digit from 1 to 9. These are considered the initial digits and cannot be changed. You must place a digit in each of the remaining empty cells to determine the unique solution that obeys three simple rules:

• No digit occurs twice in any horizontal row, vertical column or diagonal in any direction
• No digit occurs twice in any of the three larger 3x3 square regions enclosed by thick borders
• No digit occurs twice in any of the three larger triangular regions enclosed by thick borders

Now that you have to pay attention to the diagonal, everything is different!

You can select a square by using the mouse or touch screen device; once selected, the square is hilighted in yellow as long as it does not contain an initial digit. Below, a square has been highlighted, which reveals a digit pad containing the nine digits enclosed by circles. Select the digit that you want to insert into square. Here the digit "1" was chosen:

If you change your mind, double tap (or click) on a square to remove the digit that you entered (as long as the square does not contain one of the initial digits). Once all squares are filled, select Submit to see if you have solved the puzzle!

If you are playing on a computer, you can use the arrow keys (or WASD keys) to move around the available cells and enter digits using the digits on the keyboard.

If you Enable Hints then you will be prevented from placing a digit that conflicts with another digit in a square that exists either in (a) the same row; (b) the same column; (c) the same diagonal, in any direction; or (d) the same region enclosed by thick borders. But be careful! Just because you can place a digit in a square doesn't mean that it will be the correct digit in the final solution.

If you choose the Allow Potentials setting, then you can select multiple digits for a square, which will then be represented as dots over the square.

For some of the more advanced puzzles, you might determine that a square must contain one of two specific digits (or possibly more). If you have chosen to Allow Potentials in the Settings, then when you select multiple digits in the digit pad, all digits will be selected, and in the Sujiken board below • characters are drawn within the selected square. These • characters are placed in the same orientation that they appear in the digit pad. Below the player has determined that the digit 6 or 7 could appear in the selected square.

You can also mark just one potential digit for a square. If potential digits are allowed, then when just a single digit is selected in the digit pad, a "potential" button will appear below the digit pad. If you select this button, then just that one digit will be marked as potential, as shown below:

You can use the menu in the upper left corner of the app to choose from four different Sujiken puzzles with difficulty rated as beginner (one star), intermediate, challenging, and difficult (four stars).

New Sujiken puzzles are available each day!

© 2024, George Heineman