Getting to play a puzzle that just clicks with you is like finding the perfect comfort food—having it provides you with joy and you never get tired of it. While Kakuro is a logic puzzle game you can play continuously, shaking things up with a refreshing new puzzle game can be very exciting as well.

It’s understandable if you treat Kakuro as your number one preferred puzzle, but having options in case you hit a wall with a hard Kakuro puzzle or just want to do something different for a bit is always a good idea. Just like how crossword puzzle players tend to also like word search games, there are also other games out there that are the same type as Kakuro.

That’s why here, we’ll provide you with five challenging puzzles that are similar in difficulty to Kakuro puzzles but different in ways that will excite and invigorate your mind!

Logic Puzzle Variations That Are Like Kakuro

1. Hashi (Bridges)

Hashiwokakero is a logic puzzle hailing from Japan from well-known industry pioneer Nikoli Co. Ltd.

Hashi (or Bridges) is like Kakuro in the sense that it is very easy to understand and play. Solved by playing on a square or rectangular grid, there are given numbers in this puzzle as well that are called “islands”, and you must connect each one of them in a way that will add up to the clue inside the islands. Each island has values that correspond to the number of bridges that need to go into them. So if the values are 2, then two bridges must lead into that island.

The bridges can be made horizontally or vertically, but not diagonally, so they work off of the grid system. The difficulty also depends on what you prefer. Aside from the grid size, the positioning, value and number of islands also affect how hard the Hashi puzzle will be.

2. Hitori

Another classic puzzle made by Nikoli, Hitori is another grid-based puzzle that, like Kakuro puzzles, is solved by playing with digits. This time, however, the objective of this logic puzzle is to remove repetitions cell by cell while ensuring that the whole puzzle is ‘open’—meaning there should be no shaded cells that will cut off a section of the grid. Shade too much, and you risk blocking off the left or right side of the puzzle.

Shade numbers too far apart and you might be left with logic errors. It’s this act of delicate balancing that makes Hitori challenging and refreshing, but at the same time still similar to a Kakuro puzzle.

If you want to play Hitori right this instant, use this link here!

3. Sudoku

The famous Sudoku, and the most well-known and challenging puzzles made by Nikoli. If you want a change of pace from the crossword-like puzzle that is Kakuro, then try picking up the symmetrical logic grid of Sudoku! Just like most of Nikoli’s puzzles, it has a simple premise: no digit can repeat in a row, column or subgrid, and not a single cell can be left blank.

The standard 9x9 grid is the most commonly played version, with difficulty changing depending on how many clue numbers are in the grid itself. But if you want more of a challenge, there are larger grids and many offshoots that use the original Sudoku formula.

Want to have a go at Sudoku right now? Click here!

4. Futoshiki

Futoshiki, also known as “More or Less”, is a grid puzzle developed by Tamaki Seto. Like a Kakuro puzzle, it also has existing conditions that need to be met in order to solve it. Revolving around the concept of inequality, you have to fill in each cell of the grid with numbers and solve it in a way that satisfies the conditions of the grid. You’ll see that there are ">" and "< signs between some cells, and this is what makes Futoshiki unique from its fellows.

The difficulty of Futoshiki is relative to the size of its grid. If it's a 5x5 grid, then you have numbers 1 to 5 to work with. Additionally, each Futoshiki puzzle is a “well-formed” or “proper”—meaning it has only one unique solution and needs to be solved that way!

5. Kakurasu

Kakurasu is another hidden gem of a puzzle game created by Nikoli. It works just like Kakuro in the sense that it also has the clues needed to solve the puzzle on the grid itself. Incidentally, some people referred to it as Cross Sums, which is another name for Kakuro (especially in the U.S.). However, unlike Kakuro, Kakurasu has fixed values on each cell, and every single one corresponds to a value for a row and a column. So your main objective is to shade cells in such a way that they will all add up to the sum clues at the end of each row and column of the grid.

Kakurasu is one of the more challenging puzzles under Nikoli and can be tricky at first, but once you understand how the values of each cell and how they all add up, it becomes a very fun experience!

Give Other Puzzles a Try!

While specializing in one kind of puzzle is one thing, learning other puzzles can be both fun and crucial to your growth as a puzzle player. So if you want to go beyond Kakuro puzzles and find solutions to other kinds of puzzle games, there are a number of other clue-based puzzles you can try out at your own pace!