It's not actually a specific puzzle here, but a type of puzzle game I recently heard of that I suspect some here would enjoy (I know I have).

 

Sudoku is a Japanese number-game that is evidently very popular over there and catching on in the UK. It's basically just a 9x9 matrix, subdivided into 9 3x3 matrices. There are "givens" scattered all over it. Using these givens and pure logic (no guessing is needed), you can find every value by utilizing 3 rules:

 

1) each 3x3 matrix contains only 1 instance of each digit from 1 to 9

2) each row contains only 1 instance of each digit from 1 to 9

3) each column contains only 1 instance of each digit from 1 to 9

 

Thus, any blank space can only have a value not already represented in its row, column or 3x3 area. Each puzzle has only one solution, which can be reached by logic alone.

 

This site has an effectively limitless number of sudoku puzzles, and has consumed a ridiculous proportion of my time.

 

Enjoy!

 

Mokele

Oh, that's what those are called! I bought a puzzle book and it had tons of those in it, one even went bigger, 16x16 and you had to use 1-9 and all the letters in NUMBERS. I got quite good at them but then I ran out. Thanks for the site. (oh yeah, this stupid book just called them "number places"... bleh, Sudoku sounds a lot cooler)

That's odd, I can beat all the easy ones like nothing, but then I tried a medium and couldn't get it. Curious at how hard hard was, I tried one and did it easily. Maybe I just got lucky or maybe the difficulty system is a little messed up.

i'm totally addicted to these games

I heard this game today.

I hope it is still very hot all over the world.

Addicting. Ahhh!