One part of the answer has definitely to be sheer simplicity of the puzzle. The procedures of Sudoku are so easy to fathom that any person can start gaming almost immediately.Yet full mastery of the game demand vast extent of playing and patience. A Sudoku brainteaser can also be made so tricky that even a mastermind would probably have a hard time completing it.



Contrary to what many will think when they originally see a Sudoku mystery, this brain-teasing exercise doesn't require markedly high understanding of math. It is more a matter of reason and the numeral characters could, in fact, be changed with any other symbol.

The sister that never gave up

Since Sudoku is a game of reasoning and dart throwing is a game of precision and hand-eye coordination, you'd maybe think they have absolutely nothing in common. However, I have a story that could argue differently.

I have a memory of when I was a kid and we spent the summer at our cottage in the country. One day my sister and I found an old darts game - not like the expensive ones they use in real dart competitions, but more of a rugged "outdoors" (or whatnot the term is) type of dartboard with numbers from one on the outside to ten in the bulls eye, and rather hefty and sturdy darts.

Neither of us where very good at throwing darts, so it was a good plan we hung the dart board on the outside wall of an old shed. After a while however, I was able to to get quite a good score - 42 with five darts.

Luck had much to do with it of course, but now something very interesting happened. My sibling would not quit before she had gotten at least the same score as me!

I think she hacked away at that dart target for a pair of hours in a row, and had she been a creature in a comic she could surely have been portrayed with a black cloud over her head, so to speak. It was beginning to get dark before she finally had flattened my record and could allow herself to quit.

It is indeed startling to see such determination.

Although having not so much to do with Sudoku puzzles per se, I think the same kind of driving energy is also in part accountable for the addictiveness of the Sudoku puzzle.

Most might love a test, on condition that that there is really a to some degree reasonable opportunity to emerge "winning" in the end. When tackling a aptly hard Sudoku enigma a participant can sometimes enter almost a trance like state where he or she basically can't put down the pen before they have crushed the Sudoku competitive encounter. Much in the same way as it played out in that dart game many donkey's years ago.

It may of course be due to this fond memory of mine, but I see a clear connection between the simple addiction caused by our dart game and that which a Sudoku puzzle can bring about.

This is all good, as Sudoku is a very low-cost hobby that definitely bestows a good work out for the brain.However, would something catch fire in the vincinity or if someone is drowning - by all means put that Sudoku mystery aside for just a few minutes.