X-oku is an exciting new puzzle, which combines the twin challenges of crossword and sudoku to test your skill with words and numbers.
The X-oku grid contains more rows and columns than conventional crosswords, the additional squares allowing the inclusion of nine sudoku boxes. In standard sudoku puzzles, these boxes are joined, but in X-oku they are rarely connected and often aligned. Otherwise, normal sudoku rules apply: every row, every column and every 3x3 box must contain the numbers 1 to 9. The crossword element of X-oku follows regular crossword rules.
So click on today’s puzzle, pick a coloured pencil, and solve your first X-oku, typing letters in the crossword squares and drag-and-dropping the sudoku numbers.
QuiX-oku is the easiest, but if today’s puzzle is a TriX-oku or MaX-oku, a detailed explanation that will help you to solve it appears on the FAQ page, accessed via the Clues panel on the left, which will also lead you to a range of puzzles in the archive: the X-Files.