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User Name StefanStevanovitch
Member Since 2008-08-08
Total number of Feedback Posts: 4
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Last 10 Feedback Posts by StefanStevanovitch [ Search for All ]
Enjoy Sudoku 1.0.2 (iPhone)
Enjoy Sudoku comes with simple and very readable graphics, the game grid makes maximum use of available screen real estate and not a pixel is wasted. There is a large and particularly efficient number pad below the games grid. Positioning and spacing of the buttons has been designed to make optimum use of the available screen space with just enough space between the buttons for easy and accurate use. The user interface is simple, logical and beautifully efficient, it has been very imaginatively designed for fast number and notation editing with a minimum of commands. Enjoy Sudoku has by far, the best user interface of any iPhone Sudoku game that I’ve used—it is outstanding. There is an auto-fill option to automatically fill in annotations at the beginning of a game and automatically remove annotations as the game progresses. When turned off you enter and remove annotations manually. You can select between two styles of annotations. There is an option to use the traditional nine-grid notation system using a small fixed size font or you can select to use a variable size notation system using a variable size font. The variable size font is particularly useful on the small iPhone screen, especially for users with less than perfect eyesight. There is an extremely useful highlighting option where all of the cells that contain the current number are highlighted in yellow and all of the cells that contain a notation for the current number are highlighted in pink. The highlighting system is particularly useful on the small iPhone screen, where without the highlighting; scanning large numbers of tiny annotations for candidates that need editing or removing is not easy. The game has an option to turn on error checking which will highlight any illogical moves and an option to turn on a timer. Enjoy Sudoku has an outstanding hint system that will progressively coach players through many of the games standard solving strategies, from beginner level techniques right through to extremely advanced techniques. It’s clever highlighting of the game grid as it coaches the player through each technique is simply brilliant. There is unlimited undo and redo so you can quickly and easily fix mistakes or backtrack if a deduction does not work out. There is an option to bookmark the current game position so that you can quickly return to a known position if a series of deductions do not work out. There is also an option to solve the current game and you can also re-start the current game from the beginning. The game comes with 35,000 symmetrical games built in with seven levels of difficulty and importantly, there is excellent documentation describing exactly the solving skills and techniques that may be required for each level of difficulty. As you learn new techniques you can select the appropriate game level to match your current expertise. The developer offers an unlimited number of games over the Internet and each day there is a new game of the day available at the seven levels of difficulty. You can enter custom games from sources such as newspapers, puzzle books and websites. The user friendly and very efficient number entering interface employed by Enjoy Sudoku makes entering custom games a breeze. Two things are missing from Enjoy Sudoku, an option turn off auto-fill after using it to automatically fill in annotations at the beginning of a game so that you can manually remove notations as the game progresses, and an option to enter and save multiple custom games. At the time of writing this review, Enjoy Sudoku version 1.0.2 is by far the best Sudoku game for the iPhone that I’ve found. Enjoy Sudoku sets a new benchmark for iPhone Sudoku games and no other game that I’ve used comes even close to standards set by this beautifully thought-out and elegantly designed game. Highly recommended for players at every level from beginners through to experts, for casual players through to enthusiastic purists. There is a free version of Enjoy Sudoku, which will allow you to check out most of the features at no cost. [alert admin]
Wednesday, August 13 2008 @ 06:57 PM PDT
Sudoku Unlimited 1.02 (iPhone)
Badly Designed User Interface—Look Elsewhere For A Sudoku Game. 
Sudoku Unlimited comes with four very nice skins that include very readable graphics and fonts. When editing numbers and notations the selected row and column is highlighted making it easy to check for notations and numbers that may need editing during game play. Number and notation editing is done by a pop-up that uses intelligent logic to position the pop-up, it always pops-up clear of the row and column that you are editing, however, in many cases, the pop-up obscures part of the group you are editing. The pop-up is draggable, so you can drag it around the game area to allow access to all parts of the game grid without closing and reopening the pop-up. The pop-up allows you to edit multiple notations in multiple cells without closing and reopening the pop-up and you can choose between two different pop-up sizes allowing you to minimize the amount of screen area that is obscured by the pop-up. You can turn on pop-up transparency and adjust the level of transparency of the pop-up, but I found that particular option made it more difficult to see the numbers and notations on the pop-up. The more I play the Sudoku Unlimited, the more annoying and distracting the constantly moving pop-up becomes. Every time you try to edit a notation in a new cell the pop-up disappears and then reappears in a new location and you play an endless game of chase the pop-up. The need to continuously switch between notation mode and number mode is also tremendously annoying when a simple, single tap for a notation number and a double tap for a number is the obvious logical approach. I’m not a fan of pop-ups in Sudoku games and don’t see the need for them, there is plenty of screen real estate available on the rectangular iPhone screen for a number pad that doesn’t obscure the game grid. Sudoku Unlimited squanders that spare real estate with empty margins above and below the game grid. Sudoku Unlimited has a very nice implementation of auto-fill to automatically fill in annotations at the beginning of a game, you can then elect to leave auto-fill on to automatically remove notations during game play, or you can turn it off and manually remove notations— a nice compromise for Sudoku enthusiasts and purists. Once again catering for the purist, there is an option to turn on, or turn off, error display. There is also a very useful option to turn off auto locking from within the game and if you get stuck during a game you can use the hint option to make the next step in the game for you. The game generator creates games at five levels of difficulty. Games at the hardest level are very challenging and a quick check indicated that all games are valid and have only one solution. Disappointingly for Sudoku enthusiasts and purists, games are not symmetrical. Three things are missing from Sudoku Unlimited. As previously mentioned the game generator does not create symmetrical games. The second missing feature is an option to enter custom games from sources like newspapers, puzzle books and websites. The third missing feature is unlimited undo and redo so you can quickly and easily fix mistakes or backtrack if a deduction does not work out. At the time of writing this review, Sudoku Unlimited version 1.02 still has a bug that prevents it from recognizing that a game has been completed. You need to close and reopen the game, then search for cells that have been suddenly emptied; once you have reentered all the cleared cells the game will show as completed. With it’s terrible user interface, the current bug and the asymmetrical games I can’t recommend Sudoku Unlimited and suggest you look elsewhere for a Sudoku game. [alert admin]
Monday, August 11 2008 @ 08:30 PM PDT
Satori Sudoku 1.1 (iPhone)
Highly Recommended For The Serious Sudoku Player.
Satori Sudoku comes with simple and very readable graphics. There is a large and efficient number pad below the games grid with array of option buttons nicely spaced out on either side of the number pad. On the game grid selected cells are highlighted in blue making accurate annotation and number editing easy. A single tap on the number pad enters an annotation and a double tap enters a number. The user interface is simple, logical and beautifully efficient. Satori Sudoku doesn’t have auto fill to automatically fill in annotations at the beginning of a game, in it’s place there is a particularly nice auto mode that disables the buttons on the keypad that are not valid for a selected cell. For Suduko enthusiasts and purists, this mode is a touch of genius; it allows the user to quickly and efficiently manually enter all the candidate annotations at the beginning of a game without resorting to total automation. Even better, candidate annotations are not removed automatically by the application during the game, but are quickly erased manually by the user just by touching the appropriate cell; this method nicely emulates erasing pencil annotations on a traditional paper game. Editing annotations in Satori Sudoku is fast, logical, efficient and for the Suduko enthusiast represents an elegant compromise between full automation and traditional tedious repetition. The game generator creates games at variable levels of difficulty, and importantly the generated games are symmetrical. Games at the hardest level are very challenging and a quick check indicated that all games are valid and have only one solution. Three things are missing from Satori Sudoku, an option to turn on error checking, an option to disable auto lock within the game and an option to enter custom games from sources such as newspapers, puzzle books and websites, etc. If the developer ever adds in these three options Satori Sudoku will be close to perfect for the serious Sudoku player. At the time of writing this review, Satori Sudoku version 1.2 is the best Sudoku game for the iPhone that I’ve found, it is highly recommended for the serious Sudoku player. [alert admin]
Saturday, August 09 2008 @ 06:38 AM PDT
On-Core Sudoku 1.0 (iPhone)
On-Core Sudoku comes with simple and very readable graphics. It has a very useful unlimited undo and redo so you can quickly and easily fix mistakes or backtrack if a deduction does not work out. There is automatic error checking, but this cannot be turned off. On-Core Sudoku has auto fill to automatically fill in annotations at the beginning of a game. Auto fill does not automatically remove notation candidates as the game progresses, something that will please purists who prefer manual removal. Do not use auto fill after the game has started as it will automatically replace candidates you have removed by deduction. The game generator creates games at three levels of difficulty, but unfortunately the generated games are not symmetrical. Games at the hardest level are very challenging and a quick check indicated that all games are valid and have only one solution. There is a useful option to view the solution if you get really stuck and you can easily return the game to its current state. The option to enter custom games from sources such as newspapers, puzzle books, websites, etc is extremely useful. Now you can easily enter a game from your favorite daily newspaper and solve the puzzle on your iPhone. You can also save multiple games to your custom games list allowing you to enter a weeks worth of games in one session. This option alone makes On-Core Sudoku a worthwhile purchase. On-Core Sudoku uses a large pop-up for number and notation entry, the pop-up obscures approximately half of the puzzle, making it impossible to check the puzzle when entering numbers. Further more, editing notations is particularly clumsy, it requires four commands just to edit one notation and editing notations in multiple squares can only be achieved by closing and reopening the pop-up for every square. The pop-up is not draqgable so it can't be moved out of the way. Because the pop-ups location is fixed it always obscures the same portion of the puzzle and you are making at least half of your entries blind. To make matters worse the squares that you are editing are only fleetingly highlighted making it doubly easy to make mistakes. Without this very poor implementation of number and notation editing I would have given On-Core Sudoku at least 4 stars. If On-Core remove the horrible pop-up, streamline notation editing, allow automatic error checking to be turned off as an option, add continuous auto fill as an option, fix the game generator so that it only creates symmetrical games, then On-Core Sudoku would be a 5 star game. It would be the best Sudoku game for your iPhone and it would be a bargain at twice the price. It will be interesting to see the next revision. [alert admin]
Friday, August 08 2008 @ 05:35 PM PDT
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