Sudoku Zenkai

Genre: Sudoku Puzzle

Players: 1-2 Co-Op (Local / Online)

.

Review:

(Note: This game is included in the Stellar Interface + Sudoku Zenkai bundle, along with Stellar Interface)

Sudoku Zenkai is a Sudoku Puzzle game released on PC in 2018 and ported to Nintendo Switch in 2022. Unlike other games that include a selection of premade puzzles for players to solve, Sudoku Zenkai creates a potentially limitless number of puzzles through procedural generation, creating puzzles at various selectable difficulty levels.

The presentation here is good, if a bit basic. Simple, clean visuals are super-easy to read on the TV screen and mostly easy enough to read on a handheld, though the smaller notes you can make are absolutely tiny on the small screen. Thankfully, the game includes multiple selectable color palettes and character sets to choose from, so odds are good that you’ll find something to suit your fancy. These visuals are joined by some decent relaxing music, though sadly there isn’t a track list to select from.

In terms of the gameplay, the good news is that most of the controls for this game are mostly pretty good, with some good controls with both touchscreen and traditional gamepad controls, although I can’t seem to find any way to make notes without resorting to use the buttons. Still, this game mostly provides a good way to control things regardless of what way you’re playing.

One problem I have with this game is there’s no option to “check” to see if your number placements so far are correct. The game can optionally notify you if any placements directly conflict, and there’s also an optional hint system that will focus its hints on your wrong placements, but there’s no way to get a simple yes or no answer to the question “have I made any mistakes yet?”

Additionally, the multiplayer here is a bit of an afterthought, and while I’m glad it’s here, it’s not great. In local multiplayer, an additional player will control the same cursor you do, meaning you’ll be wrestling the other player for control if you’re both trying to place. There’s also online play, though I wasn’t able to test this.

In the end, while there are definitely areas that could use improvement here, Sudoku Zenkai is overall a solid Sudoku Puzzle game that doesn’t have any glaring flaws or omissions, which puts it in surprisingly rare company on the Nintendo Switch. While I cannot say that this is a truly amazing or groundbreaking entry in the genre, if you’re looking to play Sudoku on the Nintendo Switch, simply being a decent Sudoku game makes this one of the better choices on the platform.

tl;dr – Sudoku Zenkai is a Sudoku Puzzle game with a potentially limitless number of procedurally-generated puzzles. It’s not without a few small issues here and there, but overall this is a pretty solid entry in the genre, well worth getting for Nintendo Switch players who want a Sudoku game on the platform.

Grade: B-

^{You can support eShopperReviews on Patreon! Please click HERE to become a Sponsor!}

^{This month’s sponsors are Ben, Ilya Zverev, Andy Miller, Exlene, Homer Simpin, Johannes, Francis Obst, Gabriel Coronado-Medina, Jared Wark, Kristoffer Wulff, and Seth Christenfeld. Thank you for helping to keep the reviews coming!}