How to play ?

Table of contents

• Prequisites
• Game modes
• User interface
• Toolbar
• Options
• Hints

Prequisites

To play on Live Sudoku, you need, on top of the basic elements (a computer, an Internet connection, a recent browser), the Macromedia Flash 8 plug-in, and to activate Javascript.

Game modes

You will find on Live Sudoku different game modes you can access from the page with all the different sudoku puzzles.

Interface

To play sudoku, Live Sudoku offers a simple but clean user interface, composed with a grid, and buttons at the top and the bottom of the grid.

Playing with the mouse:

Click an empty cell. All the available values will appear within small balls. Click on one of these balls to select a number.

To set a pencil mark, click in the little area at the top left of each cell, then select the number of your choice. Repeat the process to remove the pencil mark.

The toolbar

On top of placing numbers in a grid, Live Sudoku offers various interesting options you can access from the buttons on top or at the bottom of the grid.

Timer

The timer counts the time spent since the game started.

Undo / Redo

These two buttons allow you to go back and forth the numbers you have placed, as if you were using the similar tools of your browser. These functions will be very helpful if you feel you went wrong at some point: you can then go back to where you made a mistake.

Send

This tool will let you send the game you're playing to a friend: he (or she) will receive a link that shows this sudoku puzzle (without the values you had already placed).

Print

ou have started a game, but you would like to finish it in the bus or the underground? Or do you prefer to play on paper and pencil? Use the "print" function to get on paper your current sudoku.

Help

This function shows a little area on the right to give you basis about the game interface.

Game options

There are two checkboxes that can be use to set your preferences.

warn on evident errors

When this checkbox is set, as soon as you place a number in a row, column, or box that already has this same value, the row, column or box will be colored to warn you of this "evident" error.

use pencil marks

When this checkbox is set, you can use pencil marks to see the different available values for every cell. Some players might want not to enable this function for the easiest puzzles. However, Live Sudoku strongly recommands you to activate and use it when you play hard levels puzzles.

Hints

There are two buttons that will help you if you get stuck somewhere or if you want to see the answer of the sudoku.

hint?

Use this link to get a hint about which number to place. You can get a direction of what to try to place, or where to try to place it. You can also get a message saying you have made on (or more) error(s), that you must correct before going further.

show the solution

If the previous hints did not suffice, use the link "the answer" for Live Sudoku to automatically fill the cell with the correct value.

hide the solution

If you requested the solution to be shown, you can use this new link to hide the answer and get back to the previous state. You will be able to resume the game if you want to.