Sudoku Addictiveness And Dart Throwing
By: Charles Hawkins

The Sudoku puzzle has hit western media and newspapers with such a massive impact, that it has to be the puzzle game launch of the century. But what is it that makes writing numbers into little squares so incredibly addictive?

One part of the equation has definitely to be sheer simplicity of the puzzle. The rules of Sudoku are so easy to understand that anyone can start playing almost immediately. Yet mastering the game requires great amounts of practise and patience. A Sudoku puzzle can also be made so difficult that even a genius would have a hard time solving it.

Contrary to what many people believe when they first see a Sudoku puzzle, this brain-teasing exercise doesn't require particularly high understanding of math. It is more a matter of logic and the numbers could, in fact, be replaced with any other symbol.

What Sudoku and throwing darts have in common

I remember 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 fancy ones they use in indoors dart competitions, but more of a rugged "outdoors" (or whatever the right term is) type of dartboard with numbers from one on the outside to ten in the bulls eye, and rather heavy and solid darts.

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

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

I think she hacked away at that dart board for a couple of hours straight, and had she been a character in a comic she would surely have been portrayed with a thunder cloud over her head, so to speak. It began to get dark before she finally had beaten my record and could allow herself to quit.

It is truly amazing to witness such determination.

Although having nothing to do with Sudoku puzzles per se, I think the same kind of driving force is also partially responsible for the addictiveness of the Sudoku puzzle.

Most people love a challenge, provided that there is actually a somewhat realistic chance to emerge "victorious" in the end. When tackling a suitably difficult Sudoku puzzle a player can sometimes enter almost a trance like state where he or she simply can't put down the pen before they have beaten the Sudoku challenge. Much in the same way as it happend in that dart game many years ago.

This is all good, as Sudoku is a very inexpensive hobby that definitely provides a good work out for the brain. However, should something catch fire nearby or if somebody is drowning - by all means put that Sudoku puzzle aside for just a few minutes.

Article Source: http://www.ArticleJoe.com

Charles Hawkins did actually not think Sudoku was anything for him. Once he tried it though, he was hooked and he now spreads the word and offers Sudoku hints on his web site.

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