Maki Kaji, ‘Godfather of Sudoku,’ dies at 69

Maki Kaji, a university dropout who turned a numbers game into one of the world’s most popular logic puzzles and became known as the “Godfather of Sudoku,” died on Aug. 10 at his home in Tokyo. He was 69. His death was announced on Tuesday by the puzzle company he co-founded, Nikoli. The cause was bile duct cancer, the company said in a statement. In a speech in 2008, Kaji said he first “fell in love” with a game called Number Place in 1984. He renamed it Sudoku.