"Ultra Sudoku" is exactly what it says on the box... a Sudoku game (a mathematical deduction game). You're given a grid and some clues, and you must position numbers in the grid such that they don't double up on each row and column and subcell (that's three things you have to worry about, kinda stressful if you ask me). That's right, you've seen these on the back of a newspaper. The business model for any developer on Steam must not be to try compete with the back of the newspaper for profit. Which is what happened here (and failed, apart from about 2-3 avid Sudoku fans who couldn't find todays newspaper).
There's a few game modes beyond just your default 9x9 grid making this arguably one of the better Sudoku games on Steam, but there's no prizes for being the best looking guy in the burns ward. Remember, this is Steam, for PC games.
For gameplay purposes, because the user interface for this game is mostly just 2D static text/images... it might as well be a web page. It's functionally no different from a browser game. And we all know, Steam isn't here to compete with Chrome and Firefox. If the game can be done in a web browser, it's just not rich or compelling enough to appeal to serious gamers on PC.
And that's part of the problem... you can play Sudoku for free on the web or on dozens of mobile apps... it's hard to recommend anyone goes through the effort of adding something to Steam (or in this case, at one point in time paying for it), downloading it, installing it, then launching it when you could just play the exact same game in a web browser.
The game features really lacklustre 2D visuals (does the developer not know 3D graphics became mainstream in the mid-1990s?). Gamers don't spend thousands of dollars on gaming rigs and the latest 3D graphics cards to play 2D games. Even mobile phones and game consoles can do 3D graphics now. There's no excuse.
Now on to pricing and value for gamers.
There's no initial download price, but the developer was charging $1 USD for this.
Price barriers, especially on low quality products, can be a direct cause of failure. It seems like a nice gesture for the game to have no up-front cost anymore, but it also tells us that the game wasn't good enough to succeed as a paid product. This is also a bit of a slap in the face to anyone who showed enough questionable judgement to pay money for this... nobody got refunded.
In terms of public reception, this failed. There's over 130 million unique gamers visiting Steam every month. SteamDB showed the game peaked at [b]only 8 concurrent players[/b]... this is a dismal public reception. This was so bad they couldn't even give it away.
Since free games don't contribute to your game collector badge and other profile stuff, is this a worthwhile addition to your Steam library?
Pass on this one. There's no immediate financial commitment, but there are thousands of more compelling games on the platform that will give you a lot more enjoyment for your time. If you want to play PC games, this barely counts. If you really want Sudoku, there's dozens of free ones on the web.
