Nintendo Revolution

So far, no clear changes or announcements on Nintendo's part have resulted from it. CBS has run several stories concerning Sudoku, including on the Early Show in Summer 2005, and on the CBS Evening News that autumn, on October 26. [39] It contains information explaining what high definition is and why they feel it is important for the Revolution to support it, plus, ideas for ways people can get involved in lobbying Nintendo to change their minds. The stunt was cleverly timed to coincide with a major road expansion, where an imposed 40 mph speed restriction allowed drivers to safely view the puzzle whilst driving. 1080up.org is an online movement started by video game enthusiasts in hopes of influencing Nintendo’s final decision regarding HD support for the Revolution. The puzzle was carved into a hillside in Chipping Sodbury, near Bristol, England, in view of the M4 motorway. DTV or EDTV sets), when compared to viewing on an analog (480i-only) television set. A Sky One publicity stunt to promote the programme with the world's largest Sudoku puzzle went awry when the 275 foot (84 m) square puzzle was found to have 1,905 correct solutions.

[38] Regardless, the support of 480p will still mean an improvement in graphics quality when properly hooked up to and viewed on an HDTV set (or any digital [non-analog] set, i.e. The audience at home was in a separate interactive competition. EDTV, currently the native output of a standard DVD), as did the GameCube, and the lack of true HD support (720p/1080i) is not yet a final decision. Conferring was permitted although the lack of acquaintance of the players with each other inhibited an analytical discussion. It has been confirmed that the Revolution will support 480p (a.k.a. Each player had a hand-held device for entering numbers corresponding to answers for four cells. In reaction, major Internet-based magazines like IGN.com organized letter writing campaigns to protest against Nintendo regarding the decision and urging consumers to take action [37]. Nine teams of nine players (with one celebrity in each team) representing geographical regions competed to solve a puzzle.

Kaplan stated beautiful graphics and innovative gameplay could be achieved without HD and that abstaining from the technology would help keep the cost of games down. It was presented by Carol Vorderman. Online arguments commenced when Nintendo of America's Vice President of Corporate Affairs, Perrin Kaplan, announced there would be no HD support for their upcoming system. As a one-off, the world's first live TV Sudoku show, Sudoku Live, was broadcast on 1 July 2005 on Sky One. On December 8, 2005, Electronic Arts officially declared its support for the Revolution. On 2 August 2005 the BBC's programme guide Radio Times started to feature a weekly Super Sudoku. It will be a futuristic overhead shooter. From July 2005 Channel 4 included a daily Sudoku game in their Teletext service (at page 391).

[26] A new video game company called NIBRIS is said to make an exclusive game called Raid over the River. Recognizing the different psychological appeals of easy and difficult puzzles The Times introduced both side by side on 20 June 2005. [25] According to Game Informer, Hideo Kojima is developing a Revolution game with the team from Kojima Productions that developed Metal Gear Acid. A simpler explanation is that the puzzle attracts and retains readers—Sudoku players report an increasing sense of satisfaction as a puzzle approaches completion. Killer 7 producer Goichi Suda, aka Suda 51, has confirmed that Grasshopper Manufacture is planning to make a Revolution game. Sudoku became particularly prominent in newspapers soon after the 2005 general election leading some commentators to suggest that it was filling the gaps previously occupied by election coverage. This game could possibly be a sequel to Golden Sun: The Lost Age. The rapid rise of Sudoku from relative obscurity in Britain to a front-page feature in national newspapers attracted commentary in the media (see References below) and parody (such as when The Guardian's G2 section advertised itself as the first newspaper supplement with a Sudoku grid on every page [16]).

Also, Camelot has announced that they are currently working on a Revolution RPG. Newspapers competed to promote their Sudoku puzzles, with The Times and the Daily Mail each claiming to have been the first to feature Sudoku. Koei and Namco/Bandai (merging) have made announcements that they will make games for Revolution but not what games yet. As the name Sudoku became well-known in Britain, the Daily Mail adopted it in place of its earlier name "Codenumber". Blitz has announced that Possession will come to all three next-gen consoles. By April and May 2005 the puzzle had become popular in these publications and it was rapidly introduced to several other national British newspapers including The Independent, The Guardian, The Sun (where it was labelled Sun Doku), and The Daily Mirror. The exclusive title is being coined off as a Doom clone. That newspaper already had plans for taking advantage of their market lead, and a first Sudoku book was already on the stocks before any other national UK papers had realised just how popular Sudoku might be.

Square Enix is working on a sequel Crystal Chronicles title, Ubisoft is releasing Splinter Cell 4 on all major consoles including Revolution, and has announced an exclusive FPS and another non-exclusive game. Until then the Times had kept very quiet about the huge daily interest that its daily Sudoku competition had aroused. It has been speculated that the new franchise might be more mature than most previous Nintendo games. The Telegraph continued to splash the puzzle on its front page, realizing that it was gaining sales simply by its presence. Nintendo has also announced that it is in the process of developing an entirely new and original franchise to be added into the Nintendo universe, although all other details about this project are unknown at this time. There is no doubt that it was not until the British Daily Telegraph introduced the puzzle on a daily basis on 23 February 2005 with the full front-page treatment advertising the fact, that the other UK national newspapers began to take real interest. It has also been hinted that older games such as Kid Icarus will be on the Revolution as well, though as of most of the Revolution's details this has only been based on speculation. The immense surge in popularity of Sudoku in British newspapers and internationally has led to it being dubbed in the world media in 2005 the "fastest growing puzzle in the world".

Many games featuring Nintendo's classic franchises, such as Mario (most likely the long awaited Mario 128), The Legend of Zelda, Metroid and Super Smash Brothers, have been announced. Nationwide News Pty Ltd began publishing the puzzle in The Daily Telegraph of Sydney on 20 May 2005; five puzzles with solutions were printed that day. This feature is included on the Xbox 360 and will be present on the PlayStation 3 as well. The Daily Telegraph introduced its first Sudoku by its puzzle compiler Michael Mepham on 19 January 2005 and other Telegraph Group newspapers took it up very quickly. Details are currently unknown. Three days later The Daily Mail began to publish the puzzle under the name "Codenumber". This method is usually, in fact, in the instruction manual, and therefore, most anybody could bypass a parental lock. The puzzles by Pappocom, Gould's software house, have been printed daily in the Times ever since.

However, this may prove unreliable as most parental control systems have a very easy way to reset the password, in case one forgets the password. Knowing that British newspapers have a long history of publishing crosswords and other puzzles, he promoted Sudoku to The Times in Britain, which launched it on 12 November 2004 (calling it Su Doku). For instance, an article listed on Nintendo's website claims that the governor of Washington, Christine Gregoire, feels that it "gives parents more information and more control over what video games their kids play and at what age."[24]. Over 6 years he developed a computer program to produce puzzles quickly. Some politicians have expressed that they are pleased with the concept of hardware based parental controls. In 1997, retired Hong Kong judge Wayne Gould, 59, a New Zealander, saw a partly completed puzzle in a Japanese bookshop. It is unknown what effect this will have on importing and playing games from one region on another region's machine; since Nintendo's consoles are also region locked, it is likely that whatever method importers use to circumvent the regional lock-out would have to override the parental lock-out as well. Sudoku has been called the "Rubik's cube of the 21st century".

This will be found in all systems released around the world; it is confirmed that the European units will use the PEGI rating system [22], North American units will use the ESRB rating system [23], units for the Japanese market will presumably use the CERO rating system, German units will use the USK system, and Austrailian units will use the OFLC system. Within the context of puzzle history, parallels are often cited to Rubik's Cube, another logic puzzle popular in the 1980s. For instance, a game carrying an ESRB rating of M for Mature, which is intended for those over the age of 17, will not play on a system that is set to only allow games rated E for Everyone (ages six and older). It is also often included in puzzle anthologies, such as The Giant 1001 Puzzle Book (under the title Nine Numbers). This allows parents to set the age level of the system, and when a disc is inserted, it will read the content rating encoded on the game discs; if this rating is greater than the system's age level setting, the game will not load unless the user correctly enters a password to override the setting. Additionally, Kappa reprints Nikoli Sudoku in GAMES Magazine under the name Squared Away; the New York Post, USA Today, The Boston Globe, Washington Post, and San Francisco Chronicle now also publish the puzzle. The Revolution will feature parental controls, prohibiting young viewers from viewing inappropriate content. Bringing the process full-circle, Dell Magazines, which publishes the original Number Place puzzle, now also publishes two Sudoku magazines: Original Sudoku and Extreme Sudoku.

[21]. Yoshimitsu Kanai published his computerized puzzle generator under the name Single Number for the Apple Macintosh [13] in 1995 in Japanese and English, for the Palm (PDA) [14] in 1996, and for the Mac OS-X [15] in 2005. An official survey conducted for Nintendo of America by marketing company Zanthus may give an idea what the "virtual console" could look like and how it might function, along with potential (but not official) prices. At least one publisher still uses that title. Nintendo recently filed a patent on the interface of the virtual console [20], suggesting that it will be a full emulator, as opposed to using re-written games, and that it may be possible to have extra features such as new characters added to the game. In 1989, Loadstar/Softdisk Publishing published DigitHunt on the Commodore 64, which was apparently the first home computer version of Sudoku. The unveiling of the new controller has also shed some light on the functionality of the backwards compatibility; specifically, when held sideways, the controller resembles the NES controller; on the left is a D-Pad, in the middle are Select and Start Buttons, and there are two buttons on the end serving as "A" and "B" buttons. Within Japan, Nikoli still holds the trademark for the name Sudoku; other publications in Japan use alternative names.

This backward-compatibility feature also stands as a new unique selling point against the Revolution's competitors. It is now published in mainstream Japanese periodicals, such as the Asahi Shimbun. If Nintendo is successful at utilizing this model, they may be able to reduce illegal ROM downloading and open up a new revenue stream. In 1986, Nikoli introduced two innovations which guaranteed the popularity of the puzzle: the number of givens was restricted to no more than 32 and puzzles became "symmetrical" (meaning the givens were distributed in rotationally symmetric cells). The music industry's most successful method of reducing illegal music downloading has apparently been to offer consumers a way to download music legally for a small cost, as in the case of Apple, selling music in their iTunes music store for a general price of $1.00 USD. At a later date, the name was abbreviated to Sudoku (数独, pronounced SUE-dough-coo; sū = number, doku = single); it is a common practice in Japanese to take only the first kanji of compound words to form a shorter version. Since computers have been powerful enough to emulate past-generation home consoles and the Internet provided an easy, fast, and widely accessible distribution path for ROM images and emulators, illegal ROM downloading has been common among a segment of fans of old games. The puzzle was named by Kaji Maki (鍜治 真起), the president of Nikoli.

Some see Nintendo trying to pattern the most successful strategy used by the music industry against illegal music downloads. The puzzle was introduced in Japan by Nikoli in the paper Monthly Nikolist in April 1984 as Suuji wa dokushin ni kagiru (数字は独身に限る), which can be translated as "the numbers must be single" or "the numbers must occur only once" (独身 literally means "single; celibate; unmarried"). Currently, Nintendo could release more than 200 potential titles (and if, like it has been rumored, the Revolution is indeed compatible with the Game Boy Player accessory, then over 90 percent of Nintendo's back catalogue could be playable on the system, excluding Virtual Boy software). The puzzle was first published in New York by the specialist puzzle publisher Dell Magazines in its magazine Dell Pencil Puzzles and Word Games, under the title Number Place (which we can only assume Garns named it). I hope Sega games will be playable as well." He also said similar in a recent interview with Nintendo Power. Although likely inspired by the Latin square invention of Leonhard Euler, Garns added a third dimension (the regional restriction) to the mathematical construct and (unlike Euler) presented the creation as a puzzle, providing a partially-completed grid and requiring the solver to fill in the rest. Yuji Naka, the designer of Sonic the Hedgehog at Sega, said in an interview with Famitsu, "It's also great that we'll be able to play Famicom and other games via download. The puzzle was designed by Howard Garns, a retired architect and freelance puzzle constructor, and first published in 1979.

Nintendo has suggested that they may give some of the downloadable games away with Nintendo products or through other special offers.[19] It is also unknown what specific titles will be available or whether third-party developers will release their older games for the Revolution, although it has been said that Nintendo is in talks with these developers for this purpose. The inverse problem—the fewest givens that render a solution unique—is unsolved, although the lowest number yet found for the standard variation without a symmetry constraint is 17, a number of which have been found by Japanese puzzle enthusiasts [11] [12], and 18 with the givens in rotationally symmetric cells. Although no specifics have yet been released, there will be fees associated with the "virtual console" feature. Since this applies to Latin squares in general, most variants of Sudoku have the same maximum. If the technical aspects of Revolution also go well, "[Nintendo is] discussing the possibility of having older games like Mario Party playable online." Merrick has also said it's possible that users will be able to download games from others regions, a feature important to European gamers who could download (for example) Super Mario RPG from an American server. The maximum number of givens that can be provided while still not rendering the solution unique is four short of a full grid; if two instances of two numbers each are missing and the cells they are to occupy form the corners of an orthogonal rectangle, and exactly two of these cells are within one region, there are two ways the numbers can be assigned. Some 3D games may "look sharper when played on Revolution." [18] However, Jim Merrick, a European Nintendo president, claimed N64 games played on Revolution will have a better frame rate, but that there would not generally be any other significant graphical improvements. The number of valid Sudoku solution grids for the 16×16 derivation is not known.

It was also said that although the gameplay would stay the same, it would be possible "that with Revolution, we may be able to see the old games with new looks." This may be compared to the 1993 SNES release Super Mario All-Stars, a single cartridge containing several classic Super Mario Bros games with updated graphics. Russell and Jarvis also showed that when symmetries were taken into account, there were 5,472,730,538 solutions [10] (sequence A109741 in OEIS). Nintendo announced that the downloadable games may be redesigned, recompiled, or emulated. The derivation of this result was considerably simplified by analysis provided by Frazer Jarvis and the figure has been confirmed independently by Ed Russell. To prevent illegal copying, downloaded games will feature a proprietary DRM system."[17]. The result was derived through logic and brute force computation. According to a Japanese press release, "all downloaded games will be stored on the 512 [MB] flash memory built into the system. This number is equal to 9! × 72² × 2⁷ × 27,704,267,971, the last factor of which is prime.

Satoru Iwata refers to this feature as the "Virtual Console". Nonetheless, the number of valid Sudoku solution grids for the standard 9×9 grid was calculated by Bertram Felgenhauer in 2005 to be 6,670,903,752,021,072,936,960 [9] (sequence A107739 in OEIS). Nintendo has announced that Revolution will have the ability to play many or all Nintendo-produced Nintendo 64, SNES/Super Famicom, and NES/Famicom games; the software may be recompiled or emulated but will be offered via the Nintendo online download service. There are significantly fewer valid Sudoku solution grids than Latin squares because Sudoku imposes the additional regional constraint. The console also has the ability to play NES, SNES, and N64 games through the Virtual Console feature. A valid Sudoku solution grid is also a Latin square. This is a first for self-loading media drives, which have previously only been able to accept discs of a single size. The puzzle is then completed by assigning an integer between 1 and 9 to each vertex, in such a way that vertices that are joined by an edge do not have the same integer assigned to them.

The Revolution's self-loading media drive accepts 8cm GameCube discs as well as the standard 12cm discs such as Revolution games and DVDs. In this case, two distinct vertices labelled by and are joined by an edge if and only if:. The side of the console (or top if stood vertically) is the GameCube docking station, featuring four controller ports and 2 memory card slots compatible with GameCube Memory Cards and the Nintendo GameCube Microphone. The vertices can be labelled with the ordered pairs , where x and y are integers between 1 and 9. Nintendo has stated that Revolution will be backward compatible with all GameCube software and most peripherals. The graph in question has 81 vertices, one vertex for each cell of the grid. Some details have however been released by Nintendo and other third parties involved with the console:. The aim of the puzzle in its standard form is to construct a proper 9-colouring of a particular graph, given a partial 9-colouring.

According to a recent interview with Nintendo's Jim Merrick, Nintendo may never release a complete system specification [16]. Solving Sudoku puzzles (as well as any other NP-hard problem) can be expressed as a graph colouring problem. Nintendo has released very little detailed information at present concerning the technical specifications of the Revolution console. This gives some indication of why Sudoku is difficult to solve, although on boards of finite size the problem is finite and can be solved by a deterministic finite automaton that knows the entire game tree. Nintendo developer Shigeru Miyamoto, before exiting the stage of Japan's 2005 Digital Interactive Entertainment Conference, stated that "there are still secrets to this controller, and these will be revealed next year.". The general problem of solving Sudoku puzzles on n² x n² boards of n x n blocks is known to be NP-complete [8]. An Ars Technica journal entry speculates that the controller may use a combination of IR and ultrasound to function, much like some existing, similar products such as "virtual whiteboards" [15]. Here are some of the more notable single-instance variations:.

Despite the controller's similarity to lightguns which are only compatible with standard-definition CRT televisions, Nintendo has stated the Revolution and its controller will be compatible with all televisions including digital projectors. Top Notch claim this as a feature designed to defeat solving programs. [14]. It is debatable whether these are true Sudoku puzzles: although they purportedly have a single linguistically valid solution, they cannot necessarily be solved entirely by logic, requiring the solver to determine the embedded words. An IGN article titled "Understanding the Revolution Controller" discusses the "shell" and includes a mock-up of what the shell might look like. The Code Doku [6] devised by Steve Schaefer has an entire sentence embedded into the puzzle; the Super Wordoku [7] from Top Notch embeds two 9-letter words, one on each diagonal. According to Satoru Iwata, it is meant for playing "the existing games, virtual console games, and multi-platform games" [13]. Recent variants have just that, often in the form of a word reading along a main diagonal once solved; determining the word in advance can be viewed as a solving aid.

The Revolution "remote" will fit inside this shell which will allow gamers to play games using a traditional controller while retaining the "remote"'s motion sensitivity. Alphabetical variations have also emerged; there is no functional difference in the puzzle unless the letters spell something. Nintendo has also announced a controller "shell" which will resemble a traditional game controller called the "Classic-Style Expansion Controller". Sequential grids, as opposed to overlapping, are also published, with values in specific locations in grids needing to be transferred to others. Nintendo has stated the aforementioned "Nunchaku" add-on may be bundled with the Revolution console. Often, no givens are to be found in overlapping regions. It will connect to the main Revolution controller via a short cord, and its appearance while connected to the main controller has led it to become dubbed "The Nunchaku". [5] Puzzles with twenty or more overlapping grids are not uncommon in some Japanese publications.

Nintendo has revealed one of these attachments to be a unit which features an analog stick and 2 trigger buttons. In The Times and The Sydney Morning Herald this form of puzzle is known as Samurai SuDoku. The controller also features an expansion port on its underside which will allow various attachments to be added to the controller. Five 9×9 grids which overlap at the corner regions in the shape of a quincunx is known in Japan as Gattai 5 (five merged) Sudoku. The "b" button is located above the "a" button, suggesting the controller can be used like an NES controller when turned counterclockwise. Puzzles constructed from multiple Sudoku grids are common. Towards the bottom of the controller are two additional buttons labeled "b" and "a". Some such variants forsake standard givens entirely.

Below the A button is a row of three small buttons labelled from left to right, Start, Home, and Select. Other kinds of extra restrictions can be mathematical in nature, such as requiring the numbers in delineated segments of the grid to have specific sums or products (an example of the former being Killer Su Doku in The Times), demarcating all places arithmetically adjacent digits appear orthogonally adjacent in the grid, providing the parity of all cells, requiring the Lo Shu Square to appear in the solution, and so on. A digital directional pad is positioned at the top of the controller face, with a large button labelled "A" directly below it and a trigger on the underside acting labelled as the "B" button. [3] [4] In this variant, all the numbers must appear in all the concentric rings as well as in all pairs of adjacent wedges. [12]. Also found is the Circular Sudoku, also known as Target Sudoku, invented by Essex mathematician Peter Higgins. An early marketing video showed actors miming such actions as fishing, cooking, drumming, conducting an orchestra, shooting a gun, sword fighting, and performing dental surgery.[11] To communicate with the sensors, the Revolution's controller uses Bluetooth technology. Another dimension in use is digits with the same relative location within their respective regions; such puzzles are usually printed in colour, with each disjoint group sharing one colour for clarity.

This allows players to mimic actual game actions such as swinging a sword or using a flashlight, instead of simply pushing buttons. The Daily Mail also features Super Sudoku X in its Weekend magazine: an 8×8 grid in which rows, columns, main diagonals, 2×4 blocks and 4×2 blocks contain each number once. Other sensors in the controller itself allow it to sense its tilt and yaw. The aforementioned Number Place Challenger puzzles are all of this variant, as are the Sudoku X puzzles in the Daily Mail, which use 6×6 grids. The controller is also able to sense motion; two sensors placed near the television allow the controller to sense its position in three-dimensional space. Often the restriction takes the form of an extra "dimension"; the most common is for the numbers in the main diagonals of the grid to also be required to be unique. The controller is shaped like a television remote control and is held with one hand. Another common variant is for additional restrictions to be enforced on the placement of numbers beyond the usual row, column, and region requirements.

The Nintendo Revolution controller sets aside the traditional controller seen in other mainstream consoles in an attempt to appeal to a larger audience. Larger grids are also possible, with Daily SuDoku's 12×12-grid Monster SuDoku [2], the Times likewise offers a 12×12-grid Dodeka sudoku with 12 regions each being 4×3, Dell regularly publishing 16×16 Number Place Challenger puzzles (the 16×16 variant often uses 1 through G rather than the 0 through F used in hexadecimal), and Nikoli proffering 25×25 Sudoku the Giant behemoths. Nintendo has since revealed three additional colors—gray/silver, lime green, and red. Puzzle Championship had a Sudoku with parallelogram regions that wrapped around the outer border of the puzzle, as if the grid were toroidal. When the console was unveiled at E3 2005 the console was colored black, however, at the Tokyo Game Show 2005 when the controller was revealed, promotional material depicted a white console. [1] Even the 9×9 grid is not always standard, with Ebb regularly publishing some of those with nonomino regions (also known as a jigsaw variation); the 2005 U.S. The front of the console features a self loading media drive illuminated by a blue LED light which will accept 12cm Revolution game discs and 8cm GameCube game discs.[10]. Although the 9×9 grid with 3×3 regions is by far the most common, numerous variations abound: sample puzzles can be 4×4 grids with 2×2 regions; 5×5 grids with pentomino regions have been published under the name Logi-5; the World Puzzle Championship has previously featured a 6×6 grid with 2×3 regions and a 7×7 grid with six heptomino regions and a disjoint region; Daily SuDoku features new 4×4, 6×6, and simpler 9×9 grids every day as Daily SuDoku for Kids.

The console will stand either horizontally or vertically. The challenge to Sudoku programmers is teaching a program how to build clever puzzles, such that they may be indistinguishable from those constructed by humans; Wayne Gould required six years of tweaking his popular program before he believed he achieved that level. The Nintendo Revolution is the smallest console Nintendo has ever manufactured, described by Nintendo as being "about the thickness of three standard DVD cases and only slightly longer". The Guardian famously claimed that because they were hand-constructed, their puzzles would contain "imperceptible witticisms" that would be very unlikely in computer-generated Sudoku. Additionally at E3 2005, Nintendo revealed that a small internal attachment (most likely a dongle) to be sold separately from the console will allow the Revolution to playback DVD movies. The Sudoku puzzles printed in most UK newspapers are apparently computer-generated but employ symmetrical givens; The Guardian licenses and publishes Nikoli-constructed Sudoku puzzles, though it does not include credits. Whether or not these discs shall retain the GameCube's discs' level of proprietary protection (having been completely nonstandard) remains to be determined. Dell Number Place Challenger (see Variants below) puzzles also list authors .

At E3 2005 Nintendo announced that the Revolution will use proprietary 12cm optical discs, as the storage medium for Revolution Games. Nikoli Sudoku are hand-constructed, with the author being credited; the givens are always found in a symmetrical pattern. The new 1T-SRAM has very low power consumption while maintaning the speed and functionality of SRAM and allowing for the density of DRAM. The puzzle generator was written with Visual C++, and although it had options to generate a more Japanese-style puzzle, with symmetry constraints and fewer numbers, Dell opted not to use those features, at least not until their recent publication of Sudoku-only magazines. The goal of 1T-SRAM is to combine the speed of SRAM with the capacity and price of DRAM. Wei-Hwa Huang claims that he was commissioned by Dell to write a Number Place puzzle generator in the winter of 2000; prior to that, he was told, the puzzles were hand-made. Nintendo has confimed that MoSys, whose 1T-SRAM memory technology was used in the GameCube, will again provide the RAM technology for the Revolution console. They also have no authoring credits — that is, the name of the constructor is not printed with any puzzle.

Recent patents suggest that downloadable DS content is a possibility. It is commonly believed that Dell Number Place puzzles are computer-generated; they typically have over 30 givens placed in an apparently random scatter, some of which can possibly be deduced from other givens. It has also been suggested that the Revolution will feature connectivity between the system and the Nintendo DS. Building a Sudoku with symmetrical givens is a simple matter of placing the undefined givens in a symmetrical pattern to begin with. Along with this comes the ability to use "Download Play." Currently featured in Nintendo's DS portable, this allows for multiplayer network games to be played across multiple systems with only one copy of the game being played loaded into a participating system. (This technique is adaptable to composing puzzles other than Sudoku as well.) Great caution is required, however, as failing to recognize where a number can be logically deduced at any point in construction—regardless of how tortuous that logic may be—can result in an unsolvable puzzle when defining a future given contradicts what has already been built. Nintendo has also announced that the consoles will be able to connect to one another wirelessly for LAN (Local Area Network) applications. This technique gives the constructor greater control over the flow of puzzle solving, leading the solver along the same path the compiler used in building the puzzle.

This device was released specifically for the DS but is likely to work with the Revolution. Such an undefined given can be assumed to not hold any particular value as long as it is given a different value before construction is completed; the solver will be able to make the same deductions stemming from such assumptions, as at that point the given is very much defined as something else. The Revolution will have built-in Wi-Fi [8], allowing certain games to be played online via a wireless hotspot or through a wireless router.[9] Nintendo has also provided a device that may be able to connect the Revolution online via a Windows XP computer, and a USB port, as well as a Broadband connection, rather than buying a Wifi router. Building a Sudoku puzzle by hand can be performed efficiently by pre-determining the locations of the givens and assigning them values only as needed to make deductive progress. As of January 2006 the specifications for the Revolution's GPU and CPU had not been released, and in an interview with Dutch game magazine [N]Gamer, Jim Merrick, Nintendo's former head of European marketing, said that they may never be.[7]. It is possible to set starting grids with more than one solution and to set grids with no solution, but such are not considered proper Sudoku puzzles; as in most other pure-logic puzzles, a unique solution is expected. However in a recent interview ATI's Public Relations Manager for Consumer Products, John Swinimer, confirmed that "Hollywood" has not been developed from PC architecture.[6]. Some online versions offer several difficulty levels.

It had previously been speculated that the "Hollywood" GPU was based off the Gamecube's GPU or existing PC hardware. This estimation allows publishers to tailor their Sudoku puzzles to audiences of varied solving experience. Many of ArtX's employees were former employees of Silicon Graphics, the company responsible for the Nintendo 64 graphics chip. Computer solvers can estimate the difficulty for a human to find the solution, based on the complexity of the solving techniques required. In February 2000, ATI acquired ArtX, the company responsible for the GameCube's GPU. It is based on the relevance and the positioning of the numbers rather than the quantity of the numbers. Nintendo has also announced that Canadian graphics card maker ATI Technologies is developing the GPU, codenamed "Hollywood" for Revolution. A puzzle with a minimum number of givens may be very easy to solve, and a puzzle with more than the average number of givens can still be extremely difficult to solve.

IBM had previously developed the processor for Nintendo's current system, the GameCube. Perhaps surprisingly, the number of givens has little or no bearing on a puzzle's difficulty. Nintendo has announced that IBM has finished developing the CPU, codenamed "Broadway". Published puzzles often are ranked in terms of difficulty. . A very fast solver is usually required for most trial-and-error puzzle-creation algorithms. Nintendo has previously standardized technologies within the gaming console world such as the D-Pad, analog control thumbstick, first party wireless controllers (Wavebird), shoulder buttons, and vibrating feedback, which have been widely disseminated following their mainstream arrival on Nintendo's machines. This is the method now preferred by many Sudoku programmers, mainly by virtue of its speed.

Top executives at the company denied this and insisted that they were simply protecting their intellectual property from imitation by competitors before the system is released. This method can be directly applied to solving Sudoku problems, counting all possible solutions for most puzzles rapidly. Nintendo has been coy with release of information regarding the Revolution, leaving some media outlets with the idea that Nintendo was not prepared or did not have the intention to compete with Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3. A highly efficient way of solving such constraint problems is Donald Knuth's Dancing Links Algorithm. [5]. Backtracking may be applied when alternate values cannot otherwise be excluded. [4] Nintendo has announced that more details about the system will be made public on May 9, 2006 at their E³ 2006 Press Conference. A constraint program specifies the constraints of the puzzle (the fact that every number in each row, each column, and each 3×3 region must be unique, and the provided "givens"); a finite domain solver applies the constraints successively to narrow down the solution space until a solution is found.

[3] In a later interview with Sankei Shimbun Iwata confirmed that the Revolution will be released in North America before Thanksgiving. Another alternative uses finite domain constraint programming. In an interview with Nikkei Business, Iwata stated the Revolution will be released after April of that year, and that they are considering attempting an international launch [2] with no more than 14 weeks of difference between the first and last launching regions. A more efficient program could keep track of potential values for cells, eliminating impossible values until only one value remains for a cell, then filling that cell in and using that information for more eliminations, and so on until the puzzle is solved. [1] Nintendo has stated the console will be launched in 2006. Although far from computationally efficient, this "brute force" method will find a solution, given sufficient computation time (even a fairly naive implementation will typically not take a noticeable amount of time). The system was unveiled at Nintendo's 2005 E³ press conference and the system's game controller was revealed at the 2005 Tokyo Game Show by Nintendo President Satoru Iwata during his keynote speech in September. If a cell cannot be filled, the program backs up one level (from that cell) and tries the next value at the higher level (hence the name backtracking).

For example, the console's controller, which can detect its exact location and orientation in 3D space, is a concept never before seen in mainstream video game consoles. This continues until a conflict occurs, in which case the next alternative value is used for the last cell changed. The codename refers to the console's promised "revolution" of the video-game industry. Typically this involves assigning a value (say, 1, or the nearest available number to 1) to the first available cell (say, the top left hand corner) and then moves on to assign the next available value (say, 2) to the next available cell. The Nintendo Revolution is the current codename for Nintendo's fifth home video game console and the successor to the Nintendo GameCube. It is also fairly simple to build a backtracking search. However, the liklihood of this is quite low- the technology (and the patents) upon which the "pitch" and "yaw" of the Revolution Controller is based was purchased by Nintendo in mid-2001 [41], well before the Eyetoy even existed. Given the self-imposed constraints of most Sudoku publishers, this method generally succeeds.

It has been suggested by some that Nintendo released the information about the real-space controller because they caught wind of a "pitch" and "yaw" handheld extension of the EyeToy that was being considered for the PlayStation 3 and therefore released the information to avoid accusations of plagiarism. These programs emulate the human logic to solve a puzzle without resorting to guesses. A reported interview with Shigeru Miyamoto seems to confirm this; however, the legitimacy of the source is unknown.[40]. For most computer programmers, coding the search for cell values based on elimination, contingencies and multiple contingencies (required for harder Sudoku) is relatively straightforward. Nintendo Power magazine has said this is likely in its July 2005 issue. The proverbial Holy Grail is to find a technique which minimises counting, marking up, and rubbing out. The Revolution may have connectivity with the Nintendo DS and the next Game Boy system. The what-if approach can be confusing unless you are well organised.

It has been rumored that the Nintendo Revolution will have the ability to download Nintendo DS video game demos that will be able to be received on the Nintendo DS. Writing candidate numbers into empty cells can be time-consuming. Nintendo may utilize an internally developed proprietary visual distortion method to be applied to all of the games compatible with the Nintendo Revolution, including NES, SNES, N64, and GameCube titles. The counting of regions, rows, and columns can feel boring. It may be possible that games that were finished and never released, such as Star Fox 2 or EarthBound Zero may be released using the Virtual Console feature. Ideally one needs to find a combination of techniques which avoids some of the drawbacks of the above elements. Due to the style and features of the controller it may be possible to play NES games that use the NES Zapper as well as the SNES Super Scope, such as Duck Hunt and Yoshi's Safari If the above rumor is true, it would also be possible to play games that use the Sega Master System's Light Gun attachment. The two main approaches to analysis are "candidate elimination" and "what-if".

Square Enix has already declared its support for the system, and will likely develop other games for the Revolution as well. When using marking, a couple of similar rules applied in a specified order can solve any Sudoku puzzle, without performing any kind of backtracking. It has been speculated that Square Enix may be releasing new additions of the Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest series on multiple systems, most likely the Revolution and the PS3. For example, if a digit appears only one time in the mark-ups written inside one region, then it is clear that the digit should be there, even if the cell has other digits marked as well. [36] It is interesting to note that if one brightens up the video, an object that just might be the transceiver for the controller can be seen above the TV. When using marking, additional analysis can be performed. [35] If this is true, this could possibly be the exclusive FPS that Ubisoft is making. When only one marking is missing, that has to be the value of the cell.

There have been rumors on the Internet about a first person shooter called No End Soon. Thus a cell will start empty and as more constraints become known it will slowly fill. If this is true, it will most likely because they would want to make a Sonic game that takes advantage of the controller rather than just a port. An alternative technique that some find easier is to mark up those numbers that a cell cannot be. There are rumors that Sega is creating a next-gen Sonic game, [33] that is different from the game announced for the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 at the Tokyo Game Show 2005, [34] for Revolution. There are two popular notations: subscripts and dots. Sega titles are already available on the GameTap Service. Many find it useful to guide this analysis by marking candidate numbers in the blank cells.

Some of the CD-based games would need to be either stored on external SD cards that the Revolution supports or delivered on optical discs, given the system's expected 512MB of internal storage. From this point, it is necessary to engage in some logical analysis. This potentially includes titles released for the SG1000, Sega Master System, Sega Genesis/Megadrive, Sega CD, Sega 32x, and Sega Saturn. Scanning stops when no further numbers can be discovered. Classic Sega titles may also be made available for download, in addition to classic Nintendo titles. Puzzles which can be solved by scanning alone without requiring the detection of contingencies are classified as "easy" puzzles; more difficult puzzles, by definition, cannot be solved by basic scanning alone. Konami may be in the process of developing two projects for Revolution. Particularly challenging puzzles may require multiple contingencies to be recognized, perhaps in multiple directions or even intersecting—relegating most solvers to marking up (as described below).

Third-party developers such as Activision, Atari, Capcom, Midway, Sega, EA Games, and THQ have made positive comments about the Revolution and will most likely be supporting the system, but have not announced any specific games themselves. When those cells all lie within the same row (or column) and region, they can be used for elimination purposes during cross-hatching and counting (Contingency example at Puzzle Japan). NIBRIS has found a Publisher for both systems. Advanced solvers look for "contingencies" while scanning—that is, narrowing a number's location within a row, column, or region to two or three cells. Raid over the River, a game developed by NIBRIS, based in Poland, is currently being developed exclusively for the Nintendo DS and the upcoming next-generation Nintendo console. Scanning consists of two basic techniques:. NGC Magazine then rebutted Nintendo's rebuttal, claiming that a senior source within Nintendo positively confirmed the alleged controller features.[32]. Scans may have to be performed several times in between analysis periods.

Nintendo later issued a statement, declaring NGC Magazine's rumor to be just that: pure speculation. Scanning is performed at the outset and periodically throughout the solution. NGC Magazine claims that The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, when inserted into the Nintendo Revolution, will utilize its native "free-hand" controller. The strategy for solving a puzzle may be regarded as comprising a combination of three processes: scanning, marking up, and analysing. Miyamoto said in an EGM interview that he is thinking of making a Pikmin game for Revolution. Each number in the solution therefore occurs only once in each of three "directions" or "scopes", hence the "single numbers" implied by the puzzle's name. Mr. The goal is to fill in the empty cells, one number in each, so that each column, row, and region contains the numbers 1–9 exactly once.

In an interview with IGN, Shigeru Miyamoto hinted that a new Kid Icarus may be in development for the Nintendo Revolution.[31]. Some cells already contain numbers, known as "givens" (or sometimes as "clues"). Animal Crossing Revolution has been confirmed by IGN. The puzzle is most frequently a 9×9 grid, made up of 3×3 subgrids called "regions" (other terms include "boxes", "blocks", and the like when referring to the standard variation; even "quadrants" is sometimes used, despite this being an inaccurate term for a 9×9 grid). Pilotwings 3 may be slated for a Nintendo Revolution release, after being cancelled for the GameCube. The puzzles are often available free from published sources and also may be custom-generated using software. [30]. The level of difficulty of the puzzles can be selected to suit the audience.

Miyamoto. Sudoku is recommended by some teachers as an exercise in logical reasoning. Mario Revolution is likely to be the long developed Super Mario 128, considering comments by Mr. The attraction of the puzzle is that the completion rules are simple, yet the line of reasoning required to reach the completion may be complex. A third Super Smash Bros. game with online play is scheduled to be released when the system launches. Numerals are used throughout this article. There is speculation that there may be up to 15 games ready for launch. Dell Magazines, the puzzle's originator, has been using numerals for Number Place in its magazines since they first published it in 1979.

In a recent IGN article, it has been suggested that the Revolution will sell for under $200. Any set of distinct symbols will do; letters, shapes, or colours may be used without altering the rules (Penny Press' Scramblets and Knight Features Syndicate's Sudoku Word both use letters). [29]. The numerals in Sudoku puzzles are used for convenience; arithmetic relationships between numerals are absolutely irrelevant. On January 25, 2006, a IGN podcast was revealed having Matt Casamassina making a comment on that he heard, but doesn't know if it's confirmed that in fact the Revolution will be using displacement mapping. In Japanese, the word is pronounced [sɯːdokɯ]; in English, it is usually spoken with an Anglicised pronunciation, [səˈdəʊkuː] (BrE) [səˈdoʊkuː] (AmE) (suh-DOE-koo) or [ˈsuːdəʊku] (BrE) [ˈsuːdoʊku] (AmE) (SOO-doe-koo). An interview at Spanish website Meristation suggests that the controller will provide force feedback, possibly through the use of gyroscopic technology. title.

[28]. S. On December 30, 2005 Nintendo released to a few select news sources that the Revolution will sell for less than $299. Other Japanese publishers refer to the puzzle as Nanpure (Number Place), the original U. Recently some patents filed by Nintendo were discovered, indicating that the Revolution may support "emboss bump mapping", a technique used by many game developers to achieve bump mapping effects with less resources. Ltd in Japan. According to Nintendo of Europe's Jim Merrick, they "have not shared everything that there is to know about Revolution or its controller.. The name Sudoku is the Japanese abbreviation of a longer phrase, "suji wa dokushin ni kagiru (数字は独身に限る)," meaning "the digits must remain single"; it is a trademark of puzzle publisher Nikoli Co.

Nintendo has been strongly hinting that not every major feature with regards to the Nintendo Revolution, and specifically its controller, has been revealed, likening it to the way that they first only revealed the fact that the Nintendo DS would have two screens, and only later revealing that it had a touchscreen, microphone, and wireless capabilities. . In an interview with ATI employee John Swinimer, it was revealed that the "Hollywood" graphics chip was built "from the ground up".[27]. The first world championship will be in Lucca(Italy) from 10 to 12 March 2006. The GPU is believed to be developed by the same team formerly known as the Californian firm ArtX which developed the graphics chip of both the GameCube and its predecessor, the Nintendo 64, before being purchased by ATI. puzzle magazine in 1979, Sudoku initially caught on in Japan in 1986 and attained international popularity in 2005. Wi-Fi by the Broadcom Corporation:. S.

Built-in 802.11b & 802.11g support.