Kakuro Blocks

There is no straight up, easy way in solving kakuro puzzles. You either sweat it out, thinking of possible combinations, or do the tedious paper and pencil method. Usually, people spend more time trying to think of combinations than actually filling in the puzzles. You know the buzz people get after solving kakuro puzzles? It usually comes after a person boasts of solving his puzzle just as his friends pointed out that he got double 8’s in a single block.

But there is a way to stop and prevent this kind of frustration. This is not about a miracle kakuro trick; rather, this is an age-old stand-by that few people take care to know. There are numbers in kakuro puzzles that only have a single valid combination and possibly, a limited number of cells. These number combinations and cells are called kakuro blocks. Accordingly, there are people who swear by using kakuro blocks to make puzzle-solving easier. This is not surprising since kakuro blocks shorten puzzle-solving time, thereby allowing players to solve more puzzles.

But before we get on with kakuro blocks’ advantages, let us first define what they are. Kakuro blocks, simply put, is just a list of...