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The Complete History of Sudoku

Sudoku Gets Popular In Japan

The Japanese have always liked puzzles, and crosswords just don't work because the Japanese written language uses characters for each word instead of letters. In 1984 the Japanese magazine Monthly Nikolist started publishing the Number Place puzzles. They were later called sudoku, an abbreviation from the longer name Suji wa dokushin ni kagiru (‘the numbers must occur once only’). This name stuck and sudoku became very popular in Japan.

Maki Kaji (pictured below) was the president of Nikoli, a puzzle manufacturer. He was known as the "Father of Sudoku" because he made the game popular in Japan. He just passed away on August 10, 2021.

Image of Maki Kaji, 'Father of sudoku'
Image by S Pakhrin from DC, USA - Maki Kaji,
CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=33939760

Sudoku will soon be popular all over the world. But it still needs some help.

Next stop: Hong Kong > >



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