From the Dark Side
by Tiny Ruisch
I only play a few games on my Android devices. With one exception, they are all either word or number games. I like to play Sudoku, Crossword Puzzles, Wordiest, Cryptograms and a few others. It has to be a pretty good game to make it to the games folders on my phone. Real Kakuro is a game that I downloaded about a week ago. I have found it to be similar to both Sudoku and Crossword Puzzles. To play the game, you also need to employ both mathematical and logical skills.
Kakuro, also known as cross sums or sum totals, is like a crossword puzzle with numbers. Each “number” must add up to the total provided at the top of the column or to the left of the row. Only the numbers 1 through 9 can be used in any row or column. Each number can only be used once. Every Kakuro game can be solved through logic alone. All of the puzzles have only one solution. If you get stuck in any particular board and think there is no solution, just reset and start over. There are 3000 puzzles to solve.
As shown in figure 1, there are five levels of play. I recommend starting with a few easy games to get a feel for how the grids are filled in. In figure 2, you can see the opening screen for the easy puzzles. The ribbon denotes that the puzzle has been completed. Figure 3 shows the opening screen of a puzzle. Under the grid, you can see a list of all the possible solutions for each row and column. These numbers change as you fill in possible answers. Answers are added with the keyboard in the bottom center. The pencil icon on the left will let you enter one or more possible choices. The pen icon is used to fill in your answer. If you enter a number that will not fit the answer, it will show in red. Selecting the eraser icon lets you delete whatever you have entered in any block. Finally, the eye icon removes the possible answer choices. Figure 4 shows the completed puzzle, except for the final answer.
I do have one minor niggle with this game. The numeric keyboard is a little small for my big fingers. I sometimes enter the wrong number without realizing that I did it. Then I have to change icons and delete it.
Like many Android games, Real Kakuro is supported by displaying advertisements. They are not intrusive and show on the top of the game play screen. After I played my second game, I paid the $2.95 in‑app purchase to remove them. Download the game from the Google Play Store. I think you will like it.
Thanks for reading.