Enter the Dojo

About Enter the Dojo

Enter the Dojo is one of Mind Loft's daily circuits: a set of its own daily games played back to back on one page. This one strings three sudokus together. Form one is Sixes, a 6x6 grid where each row, column and two-by-three box holds the digits 1 to 6. Form two is Suds, the classic 9x9. Form three changes daily, drawn from Mind Loft's sudoku variants: Frame, Sando, Quilt, Arrow, Mercury, Diag, Sumo and Knight.

The run is scored out of 100. Sixes is worth 25 points, Suds 35 and the variant 40, and each is split half for solving it and half for speed. Your total decides the belt you tie on: white, yellow, orange, green, blue, purple, brown or black. Wrong entries are not flagged as you go, as on paper, so the clock is the thing to beat.

Each of the three grids is also a daily game on its own with its own leaderboard, and a grid you already solved today counts toward the run with its first time. A new run starts at midnight Eastern time and the leaderboard resets with it. It plays in the browser with no app and no account; adding a name puts you on the leaderboard.

It suits sudoku players who want more than one grid a day and like a little pressure from the clock, and the 6x6 opener makes it a gentle start for newer solvers.

How to play Enter the Dojo

1. Open the Dojo page and press Step onto the mat to start the day's run.
2. Read the short how-to box for the first form and press Start to show the 6x6 Sixes grid.
3. Tap a square, then a number, or pick a number and tap every square it goes in; on desktop the arrow and number keys work too.
4. Use Notes (or press N) to pencil candidates, and Undo or Erase to take entries back.
5. Fill every row, column and box with no repeats, then move on to the 9x9 Suds grid and the day's variant.
6. See your total out of 100, the belt it earns, and your place on the daily leaderboard.

Screenshots

Tips

• On the 6x6 grid, scan the two-by-three boxes first: with only six squares a digit often has one place left before a row or column shows it.
• Speed counts for half of each grid's points, so solve the warm-up quickly rather than double-checking every cell.
• Read the variant's rule box carefully before pressing Start; the clock for the 40-point grid is where belts are won or lost.
• If you already played Sixes or Suds on its own page today, that time stands in the run, so play them in the Dojo first if you want one fresh attempt.

Questions