Sudoku is globally addicting puzzle game and yet there are a lot of less known facts about it. Let’s see the most amazing facts about Sudoku puzzles.
1. Sudoku became a world hit in 2005. When measuring its popularity in enigmatic world, it is the biggest phenomenon since Rubik’s Cube in the ’80s.
2. Sudoku isn’t originally Japanese, but an American game. Modern Sudoku was invented in America under the name “Number Place” (in 1979) and later popularized as “Sudoku” by Japanese publisher Nikoli. “Number Place” creator Howard Garns died in 1989, before the game reached its world popularity.
3. Most Sudoku games on the Internet (and even in newspapers) are displaying wrong puzzles – due to laziness of developers or Sudoku’s non-obvious complexity and there are fatal flaws in Sudoku generators which make no unique puzzles or miscalculate the level of difficulty.
4. Puzzles have a great amount of possible combinations and levels of complexity. There are 6 sextillions of possible puzzles, but only 5,472,730,538 of them are valid (when reduced to essentially different solutions) and you’d need a few lifetimes to solve them all. There are many levels of difficulty (at least 5, even though that is an arbitrary number) and there are enough challenges for any playing skill.
5. It is not a math game at all, there is no calculating involved – it is a pure logic game. Sudoku is semantically independent and can be easily understood by players around the world in contrast to good old crosswords which must be adapted for every language. The best part of all is that Sudoku sometimes doesn’t even come in numbers, but in pictures, letters or symbols.
6. First World Sudoku championship was held in Italy in 2006. After that, in 2007 in Prague, Czech Republic and the latest in 2008 in Goa, India. In 2009 it will be held in Slovakia.
7. Some people call it newspapers saver because it boosts their sales and keeps the reader audience active. Newspapers around the world embraced it immediately because people like to solve Sudoku on a daily basis, just like crosswords.
8. By playing it regularly you can boost your concentration and focus, prevent or ease depression, dementia and even Alzheimer’s disease according to some studies. Sudoku is good for any age between 6 or 120, because it develops mental abilities and keeps them in a good condition. It is highly addictive game with no side-effects whatsoever and while it may involve a person deeply into it, their brains will be thankful.
9. There are many players of Sudoku around the world, but nobody really knows the exact number of them, because there are various Sudoku games in existence – downloadable Sudoku for computers, online Sudoku and many others.
Conclusion:
As you can see, there are a lot of interesting facts about Sudoku. But the main point is to play these puzzles every day so that you can feel its magic. If you still don’t play Sudoku, it is good for you to start now and join the worldwide community of fans. If you do play Sudoku then teach someone who doesn’t, because it is a rare occasion in life to get an appraisal for putting a new addiction in someone’s life.