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Nikoli's Pencil Puzzle
By Mark Raby,
Common Sense Media Reviewer
Common Sense Media Reviewers
Creative number puzzles offer limited mind-bending fun.
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Nikoli's Pencil Puzzle
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What’s It About?
NIKOLI'S PENCIL PUZZLE is a collection of five number-themed puzzles, ranging from the well-known Sudoku puzzle to more creative, and at times, more challenging exercises like getting from point A to point B down a winding path using a certain number of steps. Although numbers play a key role in every puzzle mini-game, players do not need anything more advanced than a basic understanding of addition and subtraction to understand them. The puzzles are more about testing cognitive thinking, trial-and-error, and logical reasoning skills.
Is It Any Good?
Nikoli's Pencil Puzzle stands strongly as a fun, creative puzzle game. The puzzles presented to players are not the typical fare, and as such provide a fun and captivating experience to even the most veteran puzzle gamers. That being said, the selection of puzzles is limited and because many of them have specific and distinct solutions, once the puzzles are done, they're done.
Talk to Your Kids About ...
Families can talk about the use of math and numbers in this game. When do you use your math skills in real life?
Which puzzle is your favorite and why? Which puzzle do you struggle with the most?
Does playing math games like this one make learning more fun?
Game Details
- Platform: Nintendo 3DS
- Available online?: Not available online
- Publisher: Konami
- Release date: October 25, 2011
- Genre: Puzzle
- ESRB rating: E for No Descriptors
- Last updated: August 29, 2016
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