Stepping into standard sized Sudoku grids
Since making my first 6x6 grid sudoku a few weeks ago, I jumped straight into making the standard size sudoku grids. What I found initially was the same frustration found in creating renzokus in manually placing the numbers in the grid in such a way that they wouldn’t invalidate the basic rules of latin squares.
Several failed attempts would include trying to place all the 3s (or some other number) across the grid without them intersecting or by making sure each of the nine instances of a number was in a unique position across each box. These methods didn’t work, but the best thing I did try which proved successful in the end was the same placement strategy as I employed in making renzokus. I would fill in an entire row or column first. Then I would fill in a few more rows and columns and move on to filling in the rest of the grid.
As much as this technique proved successful for the first sudoku it just got in the way of being able to get to the design aspect of making sudokus.
What I would start out doing is just picking numbers from the solution that I would want the player to be able to get. I would build the start of the puzzle around trying to give the players enough so that they could get those numbers at the very least. For the first few sudokus that was my strategy to just go quick and complete the puzzles so that I could move on and learn from them.
The next two sudokus I made after this were on the train up to fencing. Instead of struggling on number placement I just googled solved sudokus and used the number placement of them so I could get straight into the meat of the design.
I think these sudokus were good to get done in that I’ve taken very simple paths to making them which is reflected in the ease of solving these sudokus. There’s way too many given digits but that’s okay. The next step for standard sudokus would be to map out the possible solving solutions and practice solving sudokus myself with them. This will give me an expanded toolset to use in making sudokus myself.
