looks great. if its available for download on April 3rd i have a feeling it will be one of the first apps i purchase M!
We just got covered on AppAdvice for anyone interested: http://appadvice.com/appnn/2010/03/sudoku-real-ipad/
Does anyone have any feedback about the screenshots? I would love to hear what you think about the look and the way the game play will work.
I like the screen shots. As long as the actual puzzle is about real life size having some of the real estate being used for menu options is just fine. You might think about having alternative backgrounds. I read comments on appadvise and I think that the negative comment was overstated. If the game takes up all the screen real estate, it would have huge numbers and huge squares. It might be an idea of how to use the screen to the left, or it might be nice to have the area just blank with a small "i" button in a corner to bring up the menu... But I think that different backgrounds would be really nice - some outdoor scenery, or cherry blossom trees, or.... You could even have that as unlockables - finish X games on a difficulty to open up some, and X games on other difficulties, etc. Or just have them available from the start.. On another subject - it is probably early to be thinking about updates - but I went over to your website and it states 400 puzzles - now that is fine, but that is of 4 difficulties and I generally find that the easy and medium are not very challenging, and so if I am working with 200 puzzles (hard and expert) - it would take a few months, but then I would be looking for more... Any thoughts to a random generator (even though the puzzles are not all that good frequently) or are you thinking about adding puzzles the original, or having in-app purchases? Again apologies for moving down the road several months. I think price is certainly reasonable, as it really looks like it would be similar to a book that one would buy.
pluto6: Thank you for the solid points of discussion you have brought up and no need to apologize for talking about the future, that's where our heads are at too. I also disagree with the guy who made the negative comment about the board size. A massive sudoku board would look a little clumsy and unnecessary to me. If it's on the iPhone, yes it makes sense to try and maximise the board size but on the iPad we've got way more space to play with. It's funny you mentioned backgrounds, we were originally going to do that but decided to go with a consistent theme at the beginning to keep the "real" look. However, we could keep that real look and apply it to different places so it looks like you're playing the board on a desk in Japan or in a plane. I also really like the idea of unlocking these backgrounds as you complete levels. On the note of levels, there will no doubt be more coming in the future. expandin: thanks! I hope everyone else thinks that too ;-)
another real look would be a newspaper background and as an added feature..the ability to doodle on the newspaper looks azmazing
I also want to ask you if there would be a lefty mode where the Sudoku is on the left and you can set it by the settings and if you don't maybe it's something to consider because I'm a lefty
Also I bet you that AppAdvice never even tried this on an iPad and most likely got all these screenshots from the emulator most likely
That is a great thought especially having some free space to doodle. I like to keep track of numbers that I don't have to worry about. @djones - yeah, different wood surfaces would also be really nice, but give some thought to a blotter that has an area for doodling. That would awesome.
I dunno, it still does seem like a waste of space to have the game board on only one half of the screen with nothing else going on on the other side. I feel that if you really want the sudoku board taking up only half of the screen, make the other half the number recognition section for finger-writing (or a persistent numpad). Like, you tap a square on the board with your left hand, then scribble or tap the number on the right side of the pad.
Will there be a way to start with all the numbers penciled in to each box? IE. I see on the bottom a couple of the boxes have 3/9 penciled in. Can you have a game start with all the numbers 1-9 turned on? Or do you have to do it manually?
Another polished Sudoku For everyone, who like polished and realistic interface, there is another option, in App Store. It's called Sudoku HD for iPad, it's beautiful and it has the most impressive package of features. Check it out on http://sudoku.crowdcafe.com/ or in app store .
