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Alastair Aitchison: Cluedoku and puzzle design

Alastair Aitchison designs electronic escape-room puzzles through Playful Technology. Cluedoku brings his work to the page, where the arrangement of a room matters as much as what a witness says about it.

Puzzle author
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View 1 reviewed book

Biography and criticism

From escape rooms to crime-scene grids

His earlier books teach spatial data. His games use physical space and props. Cluedoku gives readers a floor plan they have to interpret for themselves.

Designing problems around physical spaces

Aitchison builds puzzles around objects such as radios and telephones, using small computers and sensors to turn familiar props into parts of a game. His project notes discuss how the pieces are made and how players discover what they can do with them. He also teaches game design through workshops and talks.

In his account of designing an escape room for the American Library Association’s International Games Week, he discusses how opening new areas can advance a story. He also describes a bottleneck common in team puzzles. A single problem can hold up everyone when the next step depends entirely on its answer. That design concern looks different on paper, where one solver may be tracking several lines of deduction on the same plan.

Aitchison’s notes on designing the library escape room

Technical writing and Cluedoku

Aitchison's books for Apress explain how databases represent points, shapes, and relationships in space. They are technical manuals for people working with SQL Server. Cluedoku puts spatial relationships to a different use. A door, a wall, or the position of another person can change what a statement tells you about a square.

Cluedoku is the puzzle book reviewed here. The selected bibliography also lists two of Aitchison's spatial-data books for readers who want to trace that earlier work.

Beginning Spatial with SQL Server 2008 at Apress · Pro Spatial with SQL Server 2012 at Apress

Puzzle Books

Where to begin

The Alastair Aitchison book reviewed here

Cover of Cluedoku
Reviewed on this site

Cluedoku

3.5 / 5

In Cluedoku, Aitchison makes the floor plan itself part of the evidence. Witness statements describe rooms and relationships between people, and the shape of the grid determines which placements can coexist.

Reading order and buying help

Reading guides featuring Alastair Aitchison

December puzzle guideDecember mystery puzzles

Bibliography

Books by Alastair Aitchison

Reviews and book guides open on Book Review Guide. The full list comes from the linked bibliography source.

Cover unavailable

Not reviewed yet

Beginning Spatial with SQL Server 2008

First published 2009
Cover unavailable

Not reviewed yet

Pro Spatial with SQL Server 2012

First published 2012

Bibliographic source: Pan Macmillan author listing, with Apress references above.

Books on this site

Alastair Aitchison reviews and guides

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