Sokoban

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Sokoban
Sokoban official fan kit banner
GenrePuzzle
DevelopersThinking Rabbit
ASCII
Unbalance
PublishersThinking Rabbit
ASCII
Unbalance
CreatorHiroyuki Imabayashi
Platform
  • Various
First releaseSokoban
1982
Latest releaseThe Sokoban
2021

Sokoban[a] is a series of puzzle video games in which the player pushes boxes around in a warehouse, trying to get them to storage locations. Hiroyuki Imabayashi created the first Sokoban game in 1981 as a hobby; an enhanced version was commercially published the following year in Japan by his company, Thinking Rabbit, for the NEC PC-8801 computer. Over the years, new titles were released for various platforms, developed by Thinking Rabbit or other companies under license. The game became popular in Japan and internationally, and the official series has remained active, with its most recent title released in 2021. Sokoban has inspired unofficial versions, thousands of custom puzzles, similar games, and artificial intelligence research.

A Sokoban puzzle being solved

History

[edit]

In 1981, Hiroyuki Imabayashi created the first Sokoban game as a hobby for the NEC PC-8001 computer. The game used text-based graphics and featured five challenging levels designed by him. For the core mechanic, he was inspired by a part of the gameplay in Hudson Soft's 1980 action game, Aldebaran #1, for the MZ-80K,[2] where the player pushed luggage to act as a wall to prevent radiation.[3] Imabayashi conceptualized that in the warehouse, the boxes had to be organized, but they themselves also became obstacles in the process. He enjoyed playing the game with friends at his home. During this time, his wife's parents owned a record store with a small computer section. By chance, a salesman saw the game and suggested that it would sell. Imabayashi used a NEC PC-8801 computer in the store's computer section to port the game, enhancing the graphics and expanding the levels to twenty. In 1982, he founded his company, Thinking Rabbit, based in Takarazuka, Japan, and released this PC-8801 version as the first commercial Sokoban game in December.[4][5]

In August 1983, Sokoban Extra Edition was published as a type-in program by the Japanese magazine PC Magazine. It featured ten new puzzles.[6]

In 1984, Sokoban 2 was released, featuring a puzzle editor.[7]

New titles continued to appear throughout the rest of the 1980s on various Japanese platforms, including home computers such as the MSX and PC-9801, and video game consoles such as the Famicom, Sega SG-1000, Sega Mega Drive and Game Boy.[8] These releases were developed by Thinking Rabbit or other companies under license.[9][10] Further titles followed in the 1990s, appearing for the Super Famicom and PlayStation.

In 2001, the Japanese software company Falcon acquired the copyright to the official Sokoban games and the trademarks for Sokoban and Thinking Rabbit.[11]

Since then, Falcon has continued to develop and license official Sokoban games, including several titles available for Japanese mobile phones between 2004 and 2007.[12][13][14]

Critical reception

[edit]
PC-8801 versions
  • Sokoban (倉庫番)
    • A December 1983 issue of MICOMGAMES wrote that the puzzle's concept is simple but requires thinking comparable to Go or Shogi, and that "once you start playing, it is hard to stop" (translated from Japanese).[28]
    • In the Pasocom Game Ranking Book, it received a score of ninety-four out of one hundred points.[15]
Total Point 94
Item Difficulty Addictiveness Story Originality Value for money
Stars 4/4 5/5 5/5 5/5 5/5
IBM PC, Commodore 64, Apple II versions
  • Soko-Ban
    • In 1988, Soko-Ban received a positive review from Computer Gaming World for its IBM PC and Commodore 64 versions, which described the game as simple yet mentally challenging, and noted its addictive nature.[29]
    • In Dragon magazine, reviewers rated the IBM PC version 4½ out of five stars.[16]
    • In the Computer Entertainer newsletter, the Apple II version was recommended and received 3½ out of four stars for graphics, with the same rating for gameplay and entertainment.[30]
Famicom Disk System versions
  • Namida no Sokoban Special (涙の倉庫番スペシャル)
    • In the Japanese Family Computer magazine's All Catalog supplement, it received a score of 13.45 out of twenty-five points.[17]
Item Characters Music Controls Addictiveness Originality Overall
Score 3.79 2.51 2.53 2.05 2.57 13.45
Game Boy versions
  • Boxxle
    • In the June 1990 issue of Game Player's magazine, Tom R. Halfhill reviewed Boxxle, stating that it also required careful planning or plenty of trial and error (usually both). He noted that the game's gameplay could become repetitive because the only variations in the 108 screens were the number and arrangement of crates and the shape of the rooms.[31]
  • Sokoban (倉庫番)
    • Famitsu gave it a score of 25 out of 40.[20]
    • In the Japanese Family Computer magazine's All Catalog supplement, it received a score of 18.78 out of thirty points.[18]
Item Characters Music Controls Addictiveness Value for money Originality Overall
Score 3.02 2.99 3.31 3.26 3.10 3.10 18.78
  • Sokoban 2 (倉庫番2)
    • In the Japanese Family Computer magazine's All Catalog supplement, it received a score of 17.65 out of thirty points.[19]
Item Characters Music Controls Addictiveness Value for money Originality Overall
Score 2.81 2.86 3.01 3.14 2.91 2.92 17.65
Sega Genesis versions
  • Shove It!
    • In the June 1990 issue of Game Player's magazine, Tom R. Halfhill reviewed Shove It!, noting it was a challenging game that required players to plan their moves carefully and that its unhurried pace was a refreshing respite from frenzied action games. However, all 160 puzzles were essentially the same.[32]
  • Shijou Saidai No Sokoban (史上最大の倉庫番)
    • In the March 1990 issue of the Japanese magazine BEEP! Mega Drive, the game received a total score of 25 out of 40 (with individual reviewer scores of 5, 6, 8, and 6, each out of 10). Three of the four reviewers recommended it for puzzle enthusiasts. One reviewer questioned the release of Sokoban on the Mega Drive, wondering if people would buy the console just to play a puzzle game; another appreciated the user-friendly gameplay but noted its dated feel; and one commented that he did not find the game's main selling points—enhanced art and its 250 levels that could take months to complete—particularly appealing.[27]
    • Famitsu gave it a score of 23 out of 40.[21]
Game Gear versions
  • Sokoban (倉庫番)
    • Famitsu gave it a score of 25 out of 40.[22]
TurboGrafx-16 versions
  • Boxyboy
    • In the December 1990 issue of Game Player's magazine, Tom R. Halfhill reviewed Boxyboy, highlighting its logical, untimed puzzles and describing it as a welcome change from typical action games. He noted that it was "virtually identical" to Shove It! and Boxxle.[33]
  • Sokoban World (倉庫番World)
    • Famitsu gave it a score of 27 out of 40.[23]
PlayStation versions
  • Ultimate Sokoban (究極の倉庫番)
    • Famitsu gave it a score of 25 out of 40.[24]
  • Sokoban Basic (倉庫番ベーシック)
    • Famitsu gave it a score of 22 out of 40.[25]
  • Sokoban Nanmon Shinan (倉庫番 難問指南)
    • Famitsu gave it a score of 22 out of 40.[26]

Games

[edit]

Since its debut in 1982, Sokoban has been released on various platforms, primarily in Japan but also in other regions. Most titles are independent, though a few are sequels.

Titles in the Sokoban series[34][8]
Region Title Release Platform Developer Publisher
Japan Sokoban (倉庫番) 1982-1983 NEC PC-8801
NEC PC-6001mkII
Sharp MZ-2000
Sharp X1 		Thinking Rabbit Thinking Rabbit
Sokoban Extra Edition (倉庫番[番外編]) 1983 NEC PC-8801 PC Magazine [ja]
Sokoban 2 (倉庫番2) 1984 NEC PC-8801
NEC PC-8001mkII
Fujitsu FM-7
Sharp X1 		Thinking Rabbit
Sokoban ROM Pack (倉庫番 ROM Pack) 1984 MSX ASCII ASCII
Sokoban Tape Pack (倉庫番 Tape Pack) 1984 MSX
Sokoban (倉庫番) 1985 Game Pocket Computer Epoch Epoch
Sokoban (倉庫番) 1985 SG-1000 Sega Sega
Namida no Sokoban Special (涙の倉庫番スペシャル) 1986 Famicom Disk System ASCII ASCII
Sokoban Perfect (倉庫番Perfect) 1989 NEC PC-9801
Sharp X68000
Sharp X1
MSX2
FM Towns 		Thinking Rabbit Thinking Rabbit
Sokoban (倉庫番) 1989 Game Boy Atelier Double Pony Canyon
Sokoban 2 (倉庫番2) 1990 Game Boy
Sokoban Deluxe (倉庫番Deluxe) 1990 Namco System 1 Namco Namco
Shijou Saidai No Sokoban (史上最大の倉庫番) 1990 Sega Genesis NCS [ja] Masaya
Sokoban (倉庫番) 1990 Game Gear Thinking Rabbit Riverhill Soft
Sokoban World (倉庫番World) 1990 TurboGrafx-16 Media Rings Media Rings
Sokoban Revenge (倉庫番Revenge) 1991 NEC PC-9801 Thinking Rabbit Thinking Rabbit
Super Sokoban (Super倉庫番) 1993 Super Famicom Thinking Rabbit Pack-In-Video
Sokoban for Windows (倉庫番 for Windows) 1995 Windows Thinking Rabbit Itochu
Sokoban for Macintosh (倉庫番 for Macintosh) 1996 Macintosh
Ultimate Sokoban (究極の倉庫番) 1996 PlayStation
Sokoban Selection (倉庫番セレクション) 1997 Windows
Macintosh
Sokoban Basic (倉庫番ベーシック) 1997 PlayStation
Sokoban Basic 2 (倉庫番ベーシック2) 1998 PlayStation
Sokoban Special 102 (倉庫番スペシャル102) 1998 Windows
Ultimate Sokoban (究極の倉庫番) 1998 Windows
Sokoban Basic (倉庫番ベーシック) 1998 Windows Thinking Rabbit Unbalance [ja]
Sokoban Densetsu: Hikari to Yami no Kuni (倉庫番伝説 光と闇の国) 1999 Game Boy J Wing J Wing [ja]
Power Sokoban (Power倉庫番) 1999 Super Famicom Atelier Double Nintendo
Sokoban Nanmon Shinan (倉庫番 難問指南) 1999
2000 		PlayStation
Windows 		Unbalance Unbalance
Sokoban (倉庫番) 2000 Windows Unbalance Unbalance
Sokoban First Step (倉庫番ファーストステップ) 2004 i-mode Falcon Dwango
Sokoban Perfect (倉庫番パーフェクト) (1-1/1-2/1-3/2-1/2-2/2-3/3-1/3-2/3-3) 2005 i-mode
Konami Wai Wai Sokoban (コナミワイワイ倉庫番) 2007 i-mode Konami Konami
Sokoban Perfect Plus A-side (倉庫番パーフェクト プラス A面) 2015 Windows Falcon Thinking Rabbit
Sokoban Perfect Plus B-side (倉庫番パーフェクト プラス B面) 2015 Windows
Sokoban First Step Plus (倉庫番ファーストステップ プラス) 2016 Windows
Sokoban Revenge Reprint (倉庫番リベンジ 復刻版) 2016 Windows
Sokoban Smart (倉庫番スマート) 2018 Windows
North America Soko-Ban 1988 IBM PC
Commodore 64
Apple II 		ASCII Spectrum HoloByte
Shove It! The Warehouse Game 1990 Sega Genesis NCS [ja] DreamWorks
Boxyboy 1990 TurboGrafx-16 Media Rings NEC
Boxxle 1990 Game Boy Atelier Double FCI
Boxxle II 1992 Game Boy
Worldwide Sokoban Touch 2016 Android
iOS 		Falcon Thinking Rabbit
The Sokoban 2021 Nintendo Switch
PlayStation 4 		Unbalance [ja] Unbalance

Name genericization

[edit]

The name Sokoban is a registered trademark for video game titles. However, the core mechanic of pushing boxes to storage locations on a grid is not protected by intellectual property rights. This has enabled others to create many unofficial versions.[35] Consequently, the term "Sokoban" has become genericized; it is synonymous with the genre of box-pushing puzzle games.[36]

Cultural impact

[edit]

The active fan community has created thousands of custom puzzles spanning a wide range of difficulty,[37] as well as software tools, including puzzle editors, solvers,[38] and solution optimizers.[39]

Derivatives and variants

[edit]

Official titles

[edit]

A few official Sokoban games introduced modifications to the core mechanic of pushing boxes to storage locations in a warehouse.

  • Ultimate Sokoban (究極の倉庫番) – features themed stages with either time limits, disappearing boxes, or boxes with electrical wiring.[40]
  • Sokoban Densetsu: Hikari to Yami no Kuni (倉庫番伝説 光と闇の国) – offers a story mode in which the player must push enemies into holes and push figures onto spots.[41]
  • Power Sokoban (Power倉庫番) – an action-puzzle game in which the player shoot orbs and fill holes with rocks.[42]

Similar games

[edit]

Several games are based on Sokoban, introducing new mechanics or objectives. Examples include:

  • Picoban – the goal is to reach a teleport stone, pushing orbs onto buttons or collecting keys.[43]
  • Beanstalk – different items must be pushed into a target square in a fixed sequence.[44]
  • Pukoban – the character can pull boxes.[45]
  • Sokoboxes Duo – two pushers must collaborate to solve the puzzle.[46]

Variants

[edit]
  • Hexoban – uses a hexagonal grid instead of a square grid, allowing movements in six directions instead of four.[47]
  • Multiban – the puzzle contains more than one pusher.[48]

Program features

[edit]

Some unofficial Sokoban programs feature a "reverse mode" in which players play a puzzle backward. Starting with all boxes on storage locations, they pull the boxes to return to the initial puzzle state.[49]

Gameplay

[edit]

The game of Sokoban takes place in a warehouse, viewed from above, composed of walls and floor squares. A floor square may be empty, occupied by the player, or occupied by a box. Some floor squares are marked as storage locations. The number of storage locations equals the number of boxes. The objective of the puzzle is to push all boxes onto storage locations.[1]

The player can move one square at a time, either horizontally or vertically, onto an empty floor square.[50] Boxes and walls block the player's movement, but the player can walk up to a box and push it to an empty square directly beyond it. If a box is pushed against a wall or another box, it does not move. Pulling boxes is not possible.[51]

Playing Sokoban requires thinking several steps ahead and visualizing all possible outcomes.[52] Players should think carefully and thoroughly before pushing a box to prevent it getting trapped against a wall or other boxes.[53] A bad move can cause a deadlock from which the puzzle cannot be solved, regardless of subsequent moves.[54]

Deadlocks

[edit]

Common deadlocks are:[55][56]

  1. Two boxes are placed together along a wall. Each box blocks the other from being moved.
  2. A box in a corridor alongside a wall, which can still be pushed, but permanently lacks access to any storage location.
  3. A box in a corner.
  4. A box in a dead end.
  5. Four boxes in a square formation.
  6. Three boxes forming an L-shape in a wall corner.

Computer science research

[edit]

Sokoban has been studied using the theory of computational complexity. The computational problem of solving Sokoban puzzles was first shown to be NP-hard.[57][58] Further work proved it is also PSPACE-complete.[59][60]

Solving non-trivial Sokoban puzzles is difficult for computers because of the high branching factor (many legal pushes at each turn) and the considerable search depth (many pushes needed to reach a solution).[61][62] Even small puzzles can require lengthy solutions.[63]

The Sokoban game provides a challenging testbed for developing and evaluating planning techniques.[64] The first documented automated solver, Rolling Stone, was developed at the University of Alberta. It employed a conventional search algorithm enhanced with domain-specific techniques such as deadlock detection.[65][66] A later solver, Festival, introduced the FESS search algorithm and became the first automatic system to solve all ninety puzzles in the widely used XSokoban test suite.[67][68] Despite these advances, even the most sophisticated solvers cannot solve many complex puzzles that humans can solve with time and effort, using their ability to plan, recognize patterns, and reason about long-term consequences.[69][70][71]

Commercial success

[edit]

The first Sokoban title was a commercial success in Japan, selling over 25,000 copies by July 1984.[72][73][74]

Early Sokoban titles released for numerous Japanese home computer systems became a hit, reportedly selling over 100,000 copies in total.[75]

Spectrum Holobyte acknowledged that over 400,000 copies of the game were sold in Japan before it released Soko-Ban in the United States in 1988.[76]

See also

[edit]

Notes

[edit]
  1. ^ Japanese: 倉庫番, Hepburn: Sōko-ban; lit. 'warehouse keeper'[1]

References

[edit]
  1. ^ a b Yoshio Murase; Hitoshi Matsubara; Yuzuru Hiraga (1996). Norman Foo; Randy Goebel (eds.). Automatic Making of Sokoban Problems. Springer Science & Business Media. p. 592. ISBN 978-3-540-61532-3.
  2. ^ "Aldebaran". 月刊マイコン [ja] (in Japanese). January 1980. pp. 22–28.
  3. ^ "My conversation with Mr Hiroyuki Imabayashi". Archived from the original on June 24, 2024. Retrieved February 25, 2024. Sokoban was inspired other video game. It's a Hudson game. It was an action game in which luggage was moved as a wall to prevent radiation. I made that movement into a puzzle. [...] I found the following video about Hudson's "ALDEBARAN".
  4. ^ "ごあいさつ" [Greetings]. Sokoban.jp (in Japanese). Falcon Co., Ltd. 「倉庫番」が生まれたのは1981年の桜の花びらが舞う春でした. [...] とにかく荷物を押すというキャラクターの動きが以前から気になっていた私は、簡単なBasic言語でパズルとして組み上げたのでした.構想として、片づけるべき荷物が片づけの邪魔をするというものにしたかったのです.プログラムは割とホイホイと完成しましたが、問題となるべき面の作成には苦労しました. [...] やがて、いくつかの面を完成させた私は、知人や友人を家に招いてトライさせては楽しんでいました.ああでない、こうでないと、友人、知人が悩む姿を見ながら、ほくそ笑んでいたのです. [...] それがひょんなことから、当時、操業を始めたばかりのソフトウエア流通会社の営業マンの目に止まることになったのです. [...] 「倉庫番」を見たその営業マンが一言.売れるから作れ、と. [...] 早速、製品作りの準備を始めたのでした.そして1982年、シンキングラビットという会社を作り「倉庫番」を発売しました. [Sokoban was born in the spring of 1981 [in Japan], when cherry blossoms danced through the air. [...] I had long been fascinated by the simple action of a character pushing luggage-blocks, so I built that movement into a puzzle using BASIC. My idea was that the very boxes meant to be cleared away would also get in the way of tidying. The program itself came together fairly quickly, but designing levels that provided a real challenge proved difficult. [...] Eventually, after finishing several levels, I invited friends and acquaintances over to my home to try them, secretly grinning as I watched them struggle—'not this way, maybe that way.' [...] By chance, the game then caught the eye of a salesman from a newly established software distribution company. [...] After seeing Sokoban, he said just one thing: 'This will sell. Make it.' [...] I immediately began preparing it as a product. And so in 1982, I founded a company called Thinking Rabbit and released Sokoban.]
  5. ^ 考えるウサギはパソコンの野を駆ける! [The thinking rabbit runs through the fields of the computer!]. LOGiN [ja] (in Japanese). December 1983. pp. 136–137. 「3年程前、友人がMZを買ったと見せびらかしに家に持ってきたんです.その日、重いからと彼がMZを置いたまま帰ったのが始まりなんですよ」 パソコンのパの字も知らなかった今林氏のゲームデザイナーの道への第1歩だが、ともかくその熱中度がすごい.マニュアルを片手に3日3晩、キーボードを叩き続けた.そのあげくにゲームをひとつ作ってしまったのだ.内容はパラシュートで定位置に着地するというアクションもの.畳に座ってやっていたので、3日目には立ち上がれなくなってしまっとという.その後、すぐにPC-8001を購入. ゲームを5、6本制作する. 「今でもまだコンピュータの中に異次 元の世界が拡がっているような気がす るんです(笑). 左脳と右脳両方を半分 ずつ使う快感がありますよね. 趣味と して一生やっていく、と最初にピンと きました. ただ、 こうして仕事に追わ れるとは考えもしなかった(笑)」 そのPC-8001で作ったゲームの中にシンキングラビットの第1作であり、 現在もヒット中の "倉庫番" の原型がある.内容はほぼ同じだが、○×□のキャラクタ表示で画数は5面.友人知人を家に集めては、内輪で楽しんでいたものだ.ゲームセンスの卓抜さは、3年前すでに目立っていたのである. 「近くにある妻の実家のレコード店に、パソコンコーナーを設けるという話が もちあがりまして、直接僕はタッチし てなかったんですが、そのとき "倉庫番" を見て、これは売れる! と助言してくれた人がいたんです」 パソコンコーナーに入ったPC-8801を利用して、デザインを決めグラフィックスをきれいにして、20面まで制作. ["It all started about three years ago when a friend came over to show off his new MZ. That day, he left it at my place because it was too heavy to carry back." It marks the very first step in Mr. Imabayashi's path to becoming a game designer, even though he knew nothing about computers at the time. His enthusiasm was remarkable, as he spent three days and nights typing incessantly at the keyboard with the manual in one hand. The result was an action game in which the player had to land precisely on a target using a parachute. He said that because he had been sitting on the tatami while playing, by the third day he could no longer stand up. Soon after, he bought a PC-8001 and went on to create five or six games. "I still feel like there's another dimension expanding inside the computer," he laughed. "There's a unique pleasure in using both the left and right sides of your brain equally. From the start, I knew this was something I wanted to pursue as a lifelong hobby. I just never imagined I'd end up being so busy with it as work," he added with a smile. Among the games created on that PC-8001 was the prototype of Thinking Rabbit's first title, and still a hit today, "Sokoban." The gameplay was almost identical, though text-characters were displayed with simple symbols like ○, ×, and □, and it had five levels. I used to invite friends over and we would enjoy playing it together. His exceptional sense for game design had already stood out three years earlier. "There was talk of setting up a computer section in my wife's parents' record shop nearby. I wasn't directly involved, but at that time, someone saw "Sokoban." and told me, 'This will sell!'" Using a PC-8801 that was brought into the computer section, he refined the design, improved the graphics, and created twenty levels.]
  6. ^ 倉庫番[番外編] [Sokoban Extra Edition]. PCマガジン [ja] (in Japanese). August 1983. p. 52. 今回はこのゲームを開発した THINKING RABBIT さんにお願いして, 市販品とは別に10の倉庫をつくってもらいましたので [This time, we asked Thinking Rabbit, the developer of the game, to create ten new warehouses separate from the commercial version]
  7. ^ 倉庫番2. ログイン (雑誌) [ja] (in Japanese). July 1985. p. 76. パズルソフトのベストセラー倉庫番の新たな50面と迷路エディタがついた倉庫番 2 . [Sokoban 2, the sequel to the bestselling puzzle game Sokoban, includes 50 new levels and a maze editor.]
  8. ^ a b Tanaka, Junji; Himabayashi, Hiroyuki; Ishii, M. (1986). THE 倉庫番 [The Sokoban]. SCALE. p. 112. ISBN 4-88239-606-8.
  9. ^ "Sōkoban series - MobyGames". Archived from the original on July 22, 2025. The original puzzle game by Thinking Rabbit and any follow-ups with an official license.
  10. ^ "ごあいさつ" [Greetings]. Sokoban.jp (in Japanese). Falcon Co., Ltd. そして1982年、シンキングラビットという会社を作り「倉庫番」を発売しました.その後30年以上にも渡り、ライセンス契約も含め多くのハードウエアで「倉庫番」を移植することができました. [And so in 1982, I founded a company called Thinking Rabbit and released Sokoban. Over the following 30 years, I watched as Sokoban was ported to numerous hardware platforms, including through licensing agreements.]
  11. ^ "Sokoban Official Site". Sokoban.jp (in Japanese). Retrieved August 19, 2025. "倉庫番", "sokoban", the rabbit mark and "THINKING RABBIT" are trademarks or registered trademarks of Falcon co.,ltd. in Japan and other countries. [...] COPYRIGHT©2001 FALCON CO.,LTD. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
  12. ^ "ja:ゴエモン、詩織、ニャミが『倉庫番』に登場!" [Goemon, Shiori, and Nyami appear in "Sokoban"!] (in Japanese). Archived from the original on June 8, 2013.
  13. ^ "ja:スクウェア・エニックス ポケットパズル" [Square Enix Pocket Puzzles] (in Japanese). Archived from the original on December 14, 2005.
  14. ^ "ja:倉庫番シリーズ" [Sokoban Series] (in Japanese). Archived from the original on March 23, 2007.
  15. ^ a b 倉庫番. ja:パソコンゲームランキングブック. October 1983. p. 28. Archived from the original on May 31, 2025.
  16. ^ a b Lesser, Hartley; Lesser, Patricia; Lesser, Kirk (April 1988). "The Role of Computers". Dragon. No. 132. p. 84.
  17. ^ a b "ファミコンディスクカード ゲームボーイ スーパーファミコン オールカタログ" [FamicomDiskCard Gameboy SuperFamicom All Catalog]. Family Computer [ja]. Tokuma Shoten [ja]: 98. May 24, 1991.
  18. ^ a b "ファミコンディスクカード ゲームボーイ スーパーファミコン オールカタログ" [FamicomDiskCard Gameboy SuperFamicom All Catalog]. Family Computer [ja]. Tokuma Shoten [ja]: 199. May 24, 1991.
  19. ^ a b "ファミコンディスクカード ゲームボーイ スーパーファミコン オールカタログ" [FamicomDiskCard Gameboy SuperFamicom All Catalog]. Family Computer [ja]. Tokuma Shoten [ja]: 200. May 24, 1991.
  20. ^ a b "倉庫番". ファミ通.com. Archived from the original on May 4, 2018.
  21. ^ a b "史上最大の倉庫番". ファミ通.com. Archived from the original on October 9, 2016.
  22. ^ a b "倉庫番". ファミ通.com. Archived from the original on October 9, 2016.
  23. ^ a b "倉庫番WORLD". ファミ通.com. Archived from the original on October 9, 2016.
  24. ^ a b "究極の倉庫番 まとめ [PS]". ファミ通.com. Archived from the original on October 9, 2016.
  25. ^ a b "倉庫番ベーシック まとめ [PS]". ファミ通.com. Archived from the original on October 9, 2016.
  26. ^ a b "倉庫番 難問指南 まとめ [PS]". ファミ通.com. Archived from the original on October 9, 2016.
  27. ^ a b "BEメガ・ドッグレース" [BE Mega Dog Race]. BEEP! Mega Drive [ja]. Vol. 6, no. 2. March 1990. p. 108.
  28. ^ "Micomgames-magazine-dec-1983-sokoban" 倉庫番. MICOMGAMES (in Japanese). Vol. 1, no. 1. December 1983. p. 38. このパズル, アイデアは簡単で, だれでもすぐに憶えられるけど, ウンウン考えなければいけないのは, 碁や将棋と同程度かそれ以上.しかも, | 度やりだしたらなかなかやめられない. [The concept of this puzzle is simple, and anyone can learn it quickly, but the amount of thinking required is comparable to, or even greater than, that of Go or Shogi. Moreover, once you start playing, it is hard to stop.]
  29. ^ Wagner, Roy (May 1988). "Puzzling Encounters" (PDF). Computer Gaming World. No. 47. pp. 42–43. Archived from the original (PDF) on June 3, 2025.
  30. ^ "Computer Entertainer". Computer Entertainer. Vol. 7, no. 4. July 1988. p. 9.
  31. ^ Halfhill, Tom R. (June 1990). "Boxxle". Game Player's. Vol. 2, no. 6. p. 90.
  32. ^ Halfhill, Tom R. (June 1990). "Shove It!". Game Player's. Vol. 2, no. 6. pp. 45–46.
  33. ^ Halfhill, Tom R. (December 1990). "Boxy Boy". Game Player's. Vol. 2, no. 12. p. 90.
  34. ^ "倉庫番の歴史" [The History of Sokoban] (in Japanese). Retrieved June 2, 2025.
  35. ^ Marçal Mora Cantallops (2023). Rompecabezas: Cinco décadas de videojuegos y puzles (in Spanish). Héroes De Papel. ISBN 978-84-947149-3-1. la web está llena de múltiples clones de Sokoban [the web is full of multiple Sokoban clones]
  36. ^ Austin Barr; Calvin Chung; Aaron Williams (2021). Block Dude Puzzles are NP-Hard (and the Rugs Really Tie the Reductions Together) (PDF). CCCG (2021). p. 1. the Tetris Company vigorously defends its intellectual property against other falling-block puzzles, whereas Thinking Rabbit does not. As a result, the term "Sokoban" has become genericized; it is synonymous with the genre of box-pushing puzzle games
  37. ^ Petr Jarusek; Radek Pelánek (2010). "Difficulty Rating of Sokoban Puzzle" (PDF). Frontiers in Artificial Intelligence and Applications. 222: 140–150. doi:10.3233/978-1-60750-676-8-140. Archived from the original (PDF) on August 30, 2025. There is a very large number of levels of the puzzle freely available on the Internet. These available levels span wide range of difficulty.
  38. ^ Several efficient Sokoban solvers aim to find short, but not necessarily optimal, solutions, including JSoko, YASS, and Takaken. Balyo, Tomáš; Froleyks, Nils (2022). "AI Assisted Design of Sokoban Puzzles Using Automated Planning". In Wölfel, Matthias; Bernhardt, Johannes; Thiel, Sonja (eds.). ArtsIT, Interactivity and Game Creation. Springer. pp. 429–430. doi:10.1007/978-3-030-95531-1_29. ISBN 978-3-030-95531-1.
  39. ^ Austin Barr; Calvin Chung; Aaron Williams (2021). Block Dude Puzzles are NP-Hard (and the Rugs Really Tie the Reductions Together) (PDF). CCCG (2021). p. 1. There are over 100 publications with "Sokoban" or "倉庫番" in the title, ranging from artificial intelligence solvers and optimizers, to level generation
  40. ^ "究極の倉庫番". 倉庫番のページ (in Japanese). Archived from the original on October 4, 2022. Retrieved November 3, 2025.
  41. ^ "Puzzle GAMES! – 倉庫番伝説・光と闇の国". asahi-net (in Japanese). Archived from the original on November 4, 2025. Retrieved November 4, 2025.
  42. ^ "倉庫番　～たまを撃つもの～". Nintendo.co.jp (in Japanese). Nintendo. Archived from the original on November 3, 2025. Retrieved November 3, 2025.
  43. ^ "Picoban". April 11, 2018. Archived from the original on August 1, 2025. Retrieved August 1, 2025. Picoban is a sokoban-style puzzle game [...] the red orbs need to be moved onto buttons and that keys need to be collected before you can make it to the green teleport stone.
  44. ^ Ziwen Liu; Yang Chao (2017). "The Non-Deterministic Constraint Logic and Its Applications in Computational Complexity" (PDF). Computer Science and Application (in Chinese). 7 (5). Hans Publishers: 408–409. doi:10.12677/csa.2017.75049. Archived from the original (PDF) on June 4, 2025. Retrieved June 4, 2025. 种豆游戏(Beanstalk)是 Braingle.com 网站开发的一个在线小游戏[...].种豆游戏是在一个由一些墙体围成的二维的格子迷宫中, 控制游戏中的一个人上下左右移动, 并且推动游戏中的四种物品: 铲子、种子、化肥、浇水壶, 在迷宫中标记 X 的目标格子中完成种豆.标记 X的格子和空地一样, 人可以自由通过.要完成种豆, 须做四步, 即按顺序把铲子、种子、化肥、浇水壶依次推到目标格子.和经典的推箱子一样, 人一次只能推动一个物品. [Beanstalk is an online minigame developed by Braingle.com [...]. In Beanstalk, players control a character that can move up, down, left, or right within a two-dimensional square maze surrounded by walls. The goal is to push four types of items—shovel, seed, fertilizer, and watering can—into a single target square marked with an "X" to complete the bean-planting process. The square marked with an "X" function like an empty space that allows the player to move through it freely. To successfully plant the bean, players must complete four steps in sequence: pushing the shovel, seed, fertilizer, and watering can into the target square one after another. Similar to the classic Sokoban game, the player can only push one item at a time.]
  45. ^ Zubaran, Tadeu; Ritt, Marcus (2011). Agent motion planning with pull and push moves (PDF). 8th National Meeting on Artificial Intelligence (ENIAC 2011). Sociedade Brasileira de Computação. pp. 358–369. Archived from the original (PDF) on April 16, 2024. Retrieved June 16, 2025. Pukoban is a game on an integer grid [...] The agent can push or pull a box one cell horizontally or vertically if the destination cell is free and he has enough space to do so.
  46. ^ Aymeric du Peloux (September 4, 2021). "Multicosmos". Archived from the original on June 16, 2025. I'm creating some new levels with two wharehousemen. Above, I illustrate a level where, to be solved, a penguin and a bear have to play alternately in cooperation. It's inspired of the Sokoban game of course
  47. ^ David W. Skinner. "Hexoban". Archived from the original on April 3, 2002. Retrieved June 16, 2025. Using hexagons, instead of squares as in standard Sokoban, offers a new realm of possibilities.
  48. ^ Alfred Pfeiffer. "Multiban". Archived from the original on March 9, 2005. the idea of the well known Sokoban game is extended to mazes that contain (often also require) more than one pusher.
  49. ^ "Sokoban reverse mode".
  50. ^ 倉庫番 [Sokoban]. ログイン (雑誌) [ja] (in Japanese). August 1983. p. 125. 人間はたてよこ 4 方向の動きのみ可能で [Humans can move only in the four directions—up, down, left, and right]
  51. ^ "倉庫番とは" [What is Sokoban]. Sokoban.jp (in Japanese). Retrieved August 25, 2025.
  52. ^ "Micomgames-magazine-dec-1983-sokoban" 倉庫番. MICOMGAMES (in Japanese). Vol. 1, no. 1. December 1983. p. 38. 考えずにスイスイ荷物を動 かすと, 最後は必ず行き詰まる. 倉庫番で最 も重要なのは、最初の一手、この一手を実行 する前に、先の先まで読み切ることが大切. [If you move boxes around without thinking ahead, you will inevitably end up at a dead end. In Sokoban, the most critical move is the very first one — before making it, you must think several moves ahead and visualize all possible outcomes.]
  53. ^ 倉庫番 [Sokoban]. ログイン (雑誌) [ja] (in Japanese). August 1983. p. 125. 倉庫はすべて迷路的な作りになっているから、充分に考えてから荷物の整理にかかるのがカシコイ遊びかた.通路がせまいため、安易に動かすと荷物と壁とのハサミ打ち、なんてことになりかねない. [The warehouse is built like a maze, so it's smart to think carefully before pushing any boxes. The passages are narrow, and careless moves could leave a box trapped against the wall or other boxes.]
  54. ^ Jean-Noël Demaret; François Van Lishout; Pascal Gribomont (2008). Hierarchical Planning and Learning for Automatic Solving of Sokoban Problems (PDF). pp. 1, 2. a bad move can lead in Sokoban to a deadlock, a situation in which the solution game state is not reachable anymore.
  55. ^ "こうなるとアウトだよ" [If it gets to this, it's unsolvable]. ja:ファミコン通信 (in Japanese). July 1986. p. 30.
  56. ^ Tanaka, Junji; Himabayashi, Hiroyuki; Ishii, M. (1986). THE 倉庫番 [The Sokoban]. SCALE. p. 18. ISBN 4-88239-606-8. 倉庫番・ダメ技、こうなってしまえば一巻の終り.気をつけよう. [Sokoban — a wrong move. Once it ends up like this, it's all over. Be careful.]
  57. ^ Michael Fryers; Michael Greene (1995). "Sokoban" (PDF). Eureka (54): 25–32. Archived from the original (PDF) on September 5, 2024.
  58. ^ Dorit Dor; Uri Zwick (1999). "SOKOBAN and other motion planning problems". Computational Geometry. 13 (4): 215–228. doi:10.1016/S0925-7721(99)00017-6.
  59. ^ Joseph C. Culberson (1997). "Sokoban is PSPACE-complete" (PDF). Technical Report TR 97-02, Dept. Of Computing Science, University of Alberta. Archived from the original (PDF) on May 28, 2024.
  60. ^ Robert Aubrey Hearn (2006). Games, Puzzles, and Computation (PDF) (PhD thesis). Massachusetts Institute of Technology. pp. 98–100.
  61. ^ Andreas Junghanns; Jonathan Schaeffer (2001). "Sokoban: Improving the Search with Relevance Cuts" (PDF). Theoretical Computer Science. 252 (1–2): 5. doi:10.1016/S0304-3975(00)00080-3.
  62. ^ Yaron Shoham (2020). "FESS Draft" (PDF). p. 3.
  63. ^ David Holland; Yaron Shoham. "Theoretical analysis on Picokosmos 17". Archived from the original on June 7, 2016.
  64. ^ Timo Virkkala (2011). Solving Sokoban (PDF) (MSc thesis). University of Helsinki. p. 1.
  65. ^ Andreas Junghanns (1999). Pushing the Limits: New Developments in Single-Agent Search (PhD thesis). University of Alberta. doi:10.7939/R3W95103S.
  66. ^ Andreas Junghanns; Jonathan Schaeffer (2001). "Sokoban: Enhancing general single-agent search methods using domain knowledge". Artificial Intelligence. 129 (1–2): 219–251. doi:10.1016/S0004-3702(01)00109-6.
  67. ^ Yaron Shoham; Jonathan Shaeffer (2020). The FESS Algorithm: A Feature Based Approach to Single-Agent Search (PDF). 2020 IEEE Conference on Games (CoG). Osaka, Japan: IEEE. doi:10.1109/CoG47356.2020.9231929.
  68. ^ Yaron Shoham (2020). "FESS presentation at the CoG conference (17.5 minutes)" (video). archive.org.
  69. ^ Petr Jarusek; Radek Pelánek (2010). "Difficulty Rating of Sokoban Puzzle" (PDF). Frontiers in Artificial Intelligence and Applications. 222: 140–150. doi:10.3233/978-1-60750-676-8-140. Archived from the original (PDF) on August 30, 2025. There exist small instances that can be quickly solved by computer (using a trivial brute force algorithm) but take humans hours to solve. At the same time, there are also instances of the puzzle, which humans can solve but which are beyond capabilities of [...] artificial intelligence solvers.
  70. ^ "Let's Logic Bots Statistics" (PDF). Retrieved October 6, 2024.
  71. ^ "Sokoban Solver Statistics - Large Test Suite". Retrieved April 14, 2024.
  72. ^ 倉庫番トラの巻 [The Sokoban Strategy Guide]. POPCOM (in Japanese). July 1984. p. 101. 本格的思考ゲームの第一人者ともいえる 「倉庫番」 のパート 2 が発売され、パート 1同様好調なすべりだしをみせている.ちなみにパート 1 は、発売約1 年間で 2 万5000本あまりを売っている.2000〜3000本はざら、 1 万本売れればベストセラーというパソコンゲーム全体からみても、この数字は驚異的だ. ["Sokoban Part 2," created by what could be called the leading developer of true logic-based games, has been released and is off to a strong start just like Part 1. Incidentally, Part 1 sold more than 25,000 copies in about a year after its release. Considering that most computer games sell only 2,000 to 3,000 copies, and 10,000 is enough to be called a bestseller, these numbers are remarkable.]
  73. ^ ソフトハウス訪問 [Visiting a Software Company]. POPCOM (in Japanese). June 1984. p. 131. 「シンキングラビット」といえば昨年思考型ゲームの「倉庫番」、アドベンチャーゲームの「鍵穴殺人事件」があいついでヒット.「倉庫番」だけでもこれまでに22,000本も売れているというからきかなくてももうけている会社なのだ. [Speaking of "Thinking Rabbit," last year they had back-to-back hits with the puzzle game "Sokoban" and the adventure game "The Murder at the Keyhole." "Sokoban" alone has sold about 22,000 copies so far, so it's clear the company is doing quite well.]
  74. ^ 作者が語る自信のニューソフト [The creator proudly presents their new software]. POPCOM (in Japanese). March 1985. p. 29. 「倉庫番」はじつに3万本以上売れた [More than 30,000 copies of "Sokoban" were sold]
  75. ^ "ゲーム徹底解剖" [Game Analysis]. BEEP! Mega Drive [ja]. November 1989. p. 56. '82年シンキングラビットからPC-8001とFM-7でカセットテープでデビュー,'83年にはFDD化され「倉庫番II」となった.その後PC系では6001,8801,9801,その他,X1,SZ,IBM-JX,B-16EX,MSXなどを総ナメにし,パソコンゲームのヒット作となる.10万本を越える総売上げを出したといわれているお化けソフトだ. [In 1982, the game debuted from Thinking Rabbit for the PC-8001 and FM-7 on cassette tape. In 1983, it was converted to floppy disk format and released as Sokoban II. It then swept across PC platforms including the PC-6001, PC-8801, PC-9801, X1, SZ, IBM-JX, B-16EX, and MSX, becoming a hit in the PC game market. It was said to have been a 'monster hit' that surpassed total sales of 100,000 copies.]
  76. ^ Lafe Low (November 1988). "News Line; Made in Japan". inCider. p. 14.
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