Giveaway of the Day - Buku Sudoku

Way too large file size for such a basic game…are the backgrounds video or something? How does this compare to other Sudokus? Thanks GGAOTD?

Buku Sudoku: A Review:

Background:

Sudoku is a puzzle of Japanese origin where logic is used to arrive at a solution. The Sudoku board is a lattice consisting of nine columns and nine rows and is divided into nine 3×3 boxes. Some squares will already have numbers from 1 to 9 in them; they are called clues. Your aim is to fill all the squares with numbers or letters. There is just one rule: Every row, column and box must contain all given nine numbers or letters. Each number or letter can be used only once in any column, row or box. Remember that there is only one possible way of solving.

Quote:

Experience the puzzle sensation that is sweeping the nation. Buku Sudoku offers countless hours of Sudoku puzzle games and even teaches you how to play. Generate countless puzzles using numbers, shapes, pictures, and symbols. Choose from themes like Ancient Japan, Underwater Paradise, and Tropical Rainforest. Create and solve any Sudoku puzzle even those found online and in newspapers. The most all-inclusive Sudoku game on the market, Buku Sudoku ships with a built-in tutorial, two game modes, three difficulty levels, a robust puzzle generator, as well as options that let you create games, display hints, highlight errors, undo moves, and solve puzzles

Introduction and Installation:

This was given away towards the end of June 07. It’s a 32.7Mb download that installs to nearly 70Mb. Most of this is spread between the three themes, A tropical rainforest an underwater paradise and a Japanese theme. You’ll find each theme has an accompanying music track. Each of these is located in the

There were 43 comments most of which were complimentary. You can see all of these by following the link below. The game scored 88% of 165 votes:

http://game.giveawayoftheday.com/buku-sudoku/#comment-17083

The Game

After installing you’ll need to create shortcuts. There’s a post in the forums that tells you how to do this, both for a desk top short cut and a start menu shortcut. Follow the link below to go to the shortcut tutorial:

http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/forums/topic/2594?replies=3

This is an excellent version of Sudoku, with a variety of themes:

Japanese
Tropical Rainforest
Underwater paradise

You can play the game as classic, without any time constraints or arcade, where you are timed. There is a good selection of grids from 4×4 to 16×16 and three levels of difficulty.

The tutorials and more information that are available via the main menu or the in game menu should give those that haven’t played this popular game enough information to get started. (Go to the link below to see the rules; however the tutorial session is only captured in part)

The ‘usual’ options menu contains music and sound toggles as well as windowed/full screen options. The latter is also available at all times from the buttons at the top right hand corner of the playing area. You can select which theme you want to play the game in (see above) or select random. There are three different ways of inputting the numbers or symbols; which you can see if you follow the link below to some captured in game images.

Ways of Inputting Numbers:

Scroll over
Pop up
Panel

The game board has several buttons that allow you to undo moves, show hints and/or errors as well as a solve function, which will slowly solve the puzzle to completion, unless you click on solve again; which stops the process. This will allow you to play the game from where you stopped the solve function. You can also save the game and return to it directly from the main menu.

A variety of screenshots showing the different styles you can play the game in as well as options menu, puzzle creator and Help menus amongst others. (18 in total).

Images – All on one page:

http://s109.photobucket.com/albums/n61/Whiterabbit_01/gaotd/Buku%20Sudoku/?start=all

As a Slideshow:

http://s109.photobucket.com/albums/n61/Whiterabbit_01/gaotd/Buku%20Sudoku/?albumview=slideshow

You should find the three styles of music complement the particular themes found in this game, though if you don’t find them entertaining enough it’s a relatively simple task to change the music files for something you prefer. The music is in the form of .ogg files, which seem to be the preferred format for in game music. If you’ve previously picked up an audio converter from the giveaway project it’s relatively easy to convert some of your favorite music to the .ogg format. All you have to do once you’ve converted the files is to rename them to the ones in the games OGG folder. (Which is really easy because they are called 1, 2 and 3). If you don’t have an audio converter then look no further than the giveaway projects Freeware library because you can get a couple of freeware audio converters that will convert your MP3’s, WMA and Wav files to .ogg:

MP3 WMA Converter:

http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/freeware/2007/08/30/free-mp3-wma-converter/

MP3 WMA WAV Converter:

http://www.giveawayoftheday.com/freeware/2007/07/30/free-mp3-wma-wav-converter/

The game is fully controlled by mouse movements which will be handy for those with poor keyboard control, or those who are disabled.

Conclusion

This is a great puzzle game that if used as part of a child’s computer time may promote numeracy. They should be able to cope with the smaller grids especially if it’s set to novice. I’ll certainly be trying this out again with my children over the next few days. Both need a little more help with their numeracy (just above average in school). I’m always on the look out for novel ways of being able to help my children with their education in a fun way.

The ability to make your own levels is a plus, however if you look at the two different versions of the game (ie Arcade and classic) you will see that there are several thousand combinations to play on each game; so, unless you’re a fanatic, I doubt the editor will get much use from me, though my son really loves any game with a levels editor. He’s already tracked down quite a large number of my games with editors attached and can quite happily spend a few weeks making levels for them, for example he’s made over 100 levels for the platform game Professor Fizzwizzle and the Molten Mystery. I’ve found some of them quite hard to beat as well. He’s messed around with the Gish editor and even made a few levels for the Ricochet arkanoid. Back to the game, There’s also a function to capture the playing area and print it out, so that you can set paper versions of the game. That would have been great for anyone who commutes to work on the trains.

Although not one of my favorite games, this is worth 7 out of 10 at the very least. It’s well presented and has several options that change the game play for extended playability. This is one of those games that will always be a challenge and provided you don’t need to reinstall windows should provide years of enjoyment. If you miss or lose today’s game you can get it free for a year via Game tap; though you have to download their manager which has the usual adware attached. You do get access to a whole pile of commercial games that you get to play free until Dec 31st 2008, where I presume a whole new bunch will be added.

http://www.gametap.com/home/play/gameDetails/000409150

Thank you lots Merscom LLC and the Game Giveaway team for an excellent game.

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Alternatives

There are so many free Sudoku games to be found on the www now that it would have taken me all night and then some to check them all out. The ones I’ve linked to below were all found very quickly. Apart from the one from Game top, all the others are tagged as working in Vista. As for Imperial Sudoku, I can’t say because there was no indication as to it’s compatibility with any OS. No doubt if you are willing to spend a little more time searching you could easily turn up some very good ones. All the games below are freeware apart from the first one from Game top which is actually a commercial title that is being given away.

Imperial Sudoku (2.01Mb)

This game is quite a good alternative to today’s giveaway, with a levels editor and music to set the scene. You do get your browser opening to the Game top site when the game is closed down, otherwise there’s no restrictions. I’ve checked the download for viruses and it was clean. You can download it from:

http://www.gametop.com/download-free-games/sudoku-download/

Pure Sudoku v1.12 (8.49Mb)

Pure Sudoku received some good reviews and scored 3.5 out of 5 from 28 votes. You can place your own images into the data folder as there’s a random background shown behind the puzzle which means you can really personalize this one to your own tastes.. It works on all windows platforms from 9x to Vista:

http://www.download.com/Pure-Sudoku/3000-2111_4-10477455.html

Sudoku v1.1:

This is a very basic Sudoku game, but for the size, who cares, it does the job, though the previous two are visually more stunning. (338kb) You need Microsoft’s Net Framework v2.0 or later for this to work. 15 users voted an average of 2.5 out of 5 for this game. It works on all windows platforms from 9x to Vista.

http://www.download.com/Sudoku/3000-2111_4-10668151.html?tag=lst-1

Net Framework link:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=0856EACB-4362-4B0D-8EDD-AAB15C5E04F5&displaylang=en

Ichiban Sudoku v2 (9.17Mb) – Quote “Pit your mind against the clock while you let your body rock to the oriental hip-hop soundtrack. Create, print, solve, or hint. There are four levels of infinite puzzle creation. The tutorial provides clear and concise instruction for those totally new to Sudoku, while experts should enjoy the intuitive design which allows faster marking and solving”. This was rated 4.5 out of 5 by seven users. It works on all windows platforms from 9x to Vista.

http://www.download.com/Ichiban-Sudoku/3000-2111_4-10528276.html?tag=lst-10

And here are a couple of browser freebies for those with limited hard disc space, or just don’t want to clutter their computers with more than necessary:

Monterosa Sudoku:

http://www.monterosa.co.uk/sudoku/index.shtml

Baseball Sudoku:

http://arcade.espn.go.com/baseball-sudoku.htm

And lastly, a little off the point, but an interesting article about Merscom…..Dark Horses indeed

http://www.mcvuk.com/press-releases/34713/Merscom-to-bring-Sudoku-to-Xbox-LIVE-Arcadereg

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