CapyDoku
CapyDoku takes the coloured-region star puzzle — the family that includes Star Battle and the old N-queens problem — and dresses it in warm cream, pastel regions and a cast of cartoon animals. A board is a square grid split into coloured territories, one territory for every row. Your job is to seat exactly one animal in every row, every column and every territory, and no two animals may end up neighbours, diagonals included.
The loop is deduction rather than dexterity. Nothing is timed and nothing moves on its own: you read the board, single-tap the cells your reasoning has ruled out so they carry a cross, then double-tap the one cell you are certain about. A correct seat pops in with a score float and a rising streak bonus, while a rule-breaking one flashes orange, costs points, and burns one of the three hearts in the top bar.
Difficulty climbs on two separate axes. The first twenty levels grow the grid from four by four up to nine by nine, so the rules land before the space gets large. From level twenty-one onward the grid stays at nine by nine and the reasoning deepens instead — later boards surrender less and less to straightforward elimination before you have to start weighing cases. Expect around a minute per board early on, and considerably longer once the chains lengthen.
How to play CapyDoku
Every board is solved by elimination rather than guesswork: rule cells out until a row, column or colour region has only one candidate left, then commit to it.
- Read the coloured regions first. A board with N rows has N regions, and each region needs exactly one animal.
- Single-tap an empty cell to cross it out once you have ruled it out. Tapping a crossed cell again clears the mark.
- Drag across a line of cells to mark or clear several in one stroke — the cell you start the drag on decides whether the whole swipe crosses out or erases.
- Double-tap a cell to seat an animal there, and double-tap a seated animal to lift it back off the board.
- Watch the hearts in the top bar. A placement that breaks a rule costs one of your three and leaves the cell crossed out; losing all three ends the level.
- Tap the animal booster to have one guaranteed-correct placement made for you, or the hint booster to preview every cell that an animal already on the board rules out before those crosses are applied.
- The level is won the moment every row, column and region holds exactly one animal and none of them touch.
Tips and strategy
- Start with the smallest colour region. A territory squeezed into two or three cells has the fewest candidates, and pinning it usually cascades into the rows and columns around it.
- Seating an animal wipes out its whole row, its whole column and all eight surrounding cells. Crossing those out at once turns a single deduction into a dozen.
- A region spanning only one or two rows must claim its animal in one of them, which bars every other region from those rows. That squeeze cracks most stubborn nine-by-nine boards.
- Two regions that between them cover exactly two columns must use both, so no third region can. Spotting these paired locks is what carries you through the later levels.
- Mark freely — crosses cost nothing and the board only reads clearly once dead cells are visibly gone. Clearing a level with no wrong placements pays a bonus on top of your score.
Features
- 200 baked boards, each verified at build time to have exactly one solution
- Grids that grow from a 4x4 warm-up all the way to full 9x9 puzzles
- Three hearts per level, plus a bonus for clearing a board without a single wrong placement
- Two boosters — place-animal and exclude-hint — with three charges of each
- Eight mascots to play as: capybara, cat, dog, parrot, fox, panda, hedgehog and lion
- Tap to cross out, swipe to mark a whole run, double-tap to place
- Streak scoring, a running best score, and a rules strip that flashes whichever rule you just broke
- Your level, best score and chosen mascot are remembered in the browser; plays offline once loaded, by touch or mouse
Frequently asked questions
Is this the same as classic sudoku?
No. There are no numbers and no 3x3 boxes. CapyDoku belongs to the Star Battle family — one animal per row, per column and per colour region, with the extra rule that no two may be adjacent.
Can every board be solved without guessing?
Each board is verified at build time to have exactly one solution, so there is always a single answer to reason toward. The first ten levels are additionally checked to fall out to plain elimination.
What happens when I place an animal wrongly?
The cell flashes, you drop points, the square is left crossed out, and one heart goes. Three wrong placements end the level, and you can take the same board again.
Do the different animals change the puzzle?
No — the mascot is purely cosmetic. Swap between the eight of them with the animal button whenever you like; the board logic is identical either way.
What do the two boosters actually do?
The animal booster seats one guaranteed-correct animal for you. The hint booster highlights every cell that an animal already on the board rules out — its row, column and eight neighbours — behind a button that applies those crosses.
Will I lose my place if I close the tab?
No. The level you have reached and your best score live in your browser's local storage. Clearing site data for this page is what resets them.
