Gridlock Sudoku

Cinevva's analyzer read this game's design doc and its source, then wrote the brief below. "Make your own" hands it to the game creator as your opening message, so you start from a real spec rather than a one-line idea.

Create a playable browser puzzle game titled “Gridlock Sudoku,” a polished dark-themed 9×9 Sudoku app called a “Daily brain arena.” Use a responsive single-page layout with a deep navy/black radial-gradient background, teal and periwinkle accents, rounded translucent panels, thin blue borders, soft shadows, and bold modern sans-serif typography.

Top header: on the left show a rounded square “9×9” logo, the teal uppercase eyebrow “DAILY BRAIN ARENA,” and the large title “Gridlock Sudoku.” On the right place a NEW GAME button and a sound toggle button initially showing a speaker icon. The main content is a two-column desktop layout: a large game panel on the left and a 310px sidebar on the right; on screens below about 850px stack the sidebar below the game.

The core game is standard Sudoku on an interactive 9×9 grid. Generate a complete valid Sudoku solution by shuffling row bands, rows within bands, column stacks, columns within stacks, and the digits 1–9, then remove random cells to create the puzzle. Support five modes with these labels, clue counts, descriptions, and unlock requirements: Beginner (48 clues, “A calm warm-up.”, unlocked initially), Easy (42 clues, “A little more focus.”, requires 2 Beginner wins), Medium (36 clues, “The classic challenge.”, requires 2 Easy wins), Hard (30 clues, “For serious solvers.”, requires 2 Medium wins), and Impossible (24 clues, “No shortcuts.”, requires 2 Hard wins). Render the modes as horizontally scrollable cards above the grid. The active card has a teal border and highlighted background; locked cards are dimmed, disabled, and show a lock icon plus text such as “Win 2 Easy.” Completed modes can show a check mark.

At the top of the game panel show the current mode title, for example “Beginner Sudoku,” and the subtitle “[description] Complete the grid to unlock your next challenge.” Show three stats: a live elapsed timer formatted MM:SS, mistakes as 0/3, and current win streak. The timer runs during play and stops while paused or after completion.

The grid should be square and large, with a blue-gray outer border and visibly heavier lines separating each 3×3 box. Use alternating subtle navy box backgrounds. Given clues are bright white; user-entered correct digits are teal; selected cells have a bright teal inset outline and darker teal background. When a cell is selected, highlight its row, column, and 3×3 box as peers, and highlight other cells containing the same value. Incorrect entered values appear red with a reddish background. Empty cells can show small 3×3 candidate-note digits.

Interaction: clicking/tapping a cell selects it; given clue cells cannot be edited. Provide a toolbar with “✎ Notes: Off/On,” “💡 Hint,” “✓ Check,” and “⌫ Erase.” Provide a 1–9 numpad beneath the board. Selecting a number in normal mode enters it only if it matches the hidden solution; a wrong number increments the mistake count, displays a red warning such as “Not quite — 2 mistakes left,” and plays a short low beep. At 3 mistakes, fail the puzzle, stop it, remove the active save, and show “Too many mistakes. Start a new puzzle to try again.” Correct entries clear notes in that cell and show encouraging feedback. In Notes mode, tapping a number toggles that candidate in the selected empty cell instead of entering it, with candidates displayed in a tiny 3×3 arrangement. Hint fills the selected empty cell with its solution value and says “Hint used. Finish the rest yourself.” Check scans entered values and reports either “So far, so good.” or that a mistake is highlighted in red, with a toast for the latter. Erase clears a selected non-given cell and its notes.

When all 81 values match the solution, mark the puzzle complete, stop the timer, increment the win count for that mode and the win streak, save a local leaderboard record named “You” with mode and completion time, show “Solved in MM:SS!” and a toast like “[mode] cleared — progress saved,” and remove the active puzzle save. Keep only the 30 fastest local scores and display the best 8 sorted by time. On a new puzzle reset values, notes, mistakes, timer, and selection. The NEW GAME button starts a fresh puzzle in the current/last playable mode. CONTINUE resumes a saved unfinished puzzle when one exists, otherwise starts a new playable puzzle.

Persist progress in browser local storage: wins by mode, scores, streak, last selected difficulty, and the active puzzle including puzzle givens, solution, current values, notes, mistakes, and elapsed time. Restore the active puzzle on page load and show “Resumed your saved puzzle.” Include a RESET SAVED PROGRESS button with confirmation that clears wins, scores, streak, and active progress, then starts Beginner. Include sound feedback for correct, wrong, and completed actions, with the header sound button toggling it between speaker and muted icons.

The sidebar has two tabs, PROGRESS and LEADERBOARD. Progress is active initially and contains “Unlock path,” explanatory text that winning 2 puzzles in each mode unlocks the next, a list of all five modes showing each count out of 2 and lock/mastery status, a gradient teal-to-periwinkle CONTINUE button, and Reset saved progress. The leaderboard tab contains “Local leaderboard,” explanatory text that these are locally saved best times, rows with rank, player name, mode/date, and formatted time, plus a CLEAR LOCAL SCORES button. Add a small bottom toast notification for saves, failures, and checks. Support keyboard input: number keys 1–9, Backspace/Delete to erase, N to toggle notes, Escape to pause/resume, and arrow keys to move selection within the grid. Include a PAUSE button under the numpad that changes to “▶ Resume,” stops the timer, and displays “Paused — your timer is stopped.”