Summary:
Number Blocks puzzles are created in Puzzle Maker Pro by choosing a grid size and difficulty, generating,
and exporting the puzzle with its matching solution. This tutorial shows how to make your first puzzle,
style it, title it, and export publish-ready pages — one puzzle or a whole batch, from the same settings.
Overview
Number Blocks (also known as Suguru or Tectonic) is a cage-based logic puzzle with no content to source —
the digits are the puzzle logic itself, so there’s no word list or image set to prepare before you
generate. This tutorial walks through creating one in Puzzle Maker Pro, from opening the module to
exporting a print-ready puzzle and solution. The module uses the shared Creator layout — Puzzle Settings
/ Style / Titles — so if you have used another Puzzle Maker Pro module the flow will feel familiar. New
to the puzzle itself? Read How Number Blocks Puzzles Work first.
Required Modules
- Puzzle Maker Pro – Number Blocks
- For batch book production, you need Productivity (adds Time Saver + unlimited / mixed-set Puzzle Book Studio). Creative already makes full-design Number Blocks puzzles — every grid size and difficulty, full styling, and single-set Puzzle Book Studio — for one book or product at a time. The optional Interactive add-on layers onto either tier and adds interactive PDF, Puzzle Slides, and Online Play. Number Blocks does not offer a Lite edition. See Puzzle Maker Pro Editions Explained.
A free demo of every module is available, so you can try Number Blocks before buying.
Preparation
No word lists or images to prepare — Number Blocks digits are fixed puzzle logic, not customizable content, so there’s no content-prep step slowing down a batch run: settings in, full book out. For your first puzzle, an 8 × 8 grid at Medium difficulty is a comfortable starting point. Every puzzle is generated guess-free with exactly one solution, at every difficulty, and each run uses a fresh layout rather than a fixed template pool — cage shapes and clue placement vary puzzle to puzzle and book to book, so even a multi-book series won’t visibly repeat.
Choose the Main Settings
On the Puzzle Settings tab, set the options that define the puzzle:
- Grid size: 5 × 5, 6 × 6, 7 × 7, 8 × 8 (default), 9 × 9, 10 × 10, 11 × 11, or the tall/wide 5 × 10 and 10 × 5 layouts. As a rough guide: 5 × 5–6 × 6 suits early-elementary worksheets or warm-ups, 7 × 7–8 × 8 fits upper-elementary/middle-school or a general puzzle book, and 9 × 9–11 × 11 suits teens, adults, or an extended solving session. The 5 × 10 / 10 × 5 layouts fit a single worksheet column.
- Difficulty: Easy, Medium (default), or Hard. Easy is single-step logic throughout, good for a first puzzle or younger/beginner solvers; Medium (the default) needs the same single-step logic but with fewer hints, so you hunt more for the next move; Hard adds two deeper checks and suits confident solvers, teens and up, or an adult puzzle book. See How Number Blocks Puzzles Work for exactly what each level requires.
Generate and Preview
Set Quantity to 1 while you dial in the size and look, then generate a preview. Every run makes a fresh puzzle, with its matching solution built at the same time. When the look is right, raise Quantity — a 100-puzzle Medium 8 × 8 book generates from that same settings pass, each puzzle unique — single and batch are the same workflow, just a different number.
Style the Puzzle
Number Blocks uses the shared style panel on the Style tab, with six controls specific to this module: Numbers (the digit font), Canvas, Cell fill, Cell border (the thin lines inside a cage), Region border (the bold lines that mark cage boundaries), and Puzzle border (the outer frame, which styles independently of the region border). For full styling guidance, use the shared styling tutorial linked below rather than repeating it here. One quick win: thickening the region border helps cage boundaries stay legible on a black-and-white photocopy.
Set the Title
On the Titles tab, choose a Smart Title. A Smart Title fills in the puzzle’s own details automatically, so every page in a batch is labelled correctly without retyping. Number Blocks offers four formulas — name alone, name + grid size, name + difficulty, and name + grid size + difficulty — under three alternate names (Number Blocks, Suguru, Tectonic), plus a name-free variant and Custom. Examples below are for an 8 × 8 Medium puzzle:
- Number Blocks — e.g. “Number Blocks”
- Number Blocks Grid Size — e.g. “Number Blocks 8 × 8”
- Number Blocks Difficulty — e.g. “Number Blocks Medium”
- Number Blocks Grid Size Difficulty — e.g. “Number Blocks 8 × 8 Medium”
- Suguru — e.g. “Suguru”
- Suguru Grid Size — e.g. “Suguru 8 × 8”
- Suguru Difficulty — e.g. “Suguru Medium”
- Suguru Grid Size Difficulty — e.g. “Suguru 8 × 8 Medium”
- Tectonic — e.g. “Tectonic”
- Tectonic Grid Size — e.g. “Tectonic 8 × 8”
- Tectonic Difficulty — e.g. “Tectonic Medium”
- Tectonic Grid Size Difficulty — e.g. “Tectonic 8 × 8 Medium”
- Grid Size — e.g. “8 × 8”
- Difficulty — e.g. “Medium”
- Grid Size Difficulty — e.g. “8 × 8 Medium”
- Custom — your own title text (the default selection)
Picking one of the three alternate names lets you title a book to match what your market searches for — “Suguru” is the common name in US/UK puzzle books, “Tectonic” in Dutch and Benelux magazines. The same options are available for the puzzle Description (the default reads “Fill each cage with 1..N; identical digits may not touch, not even diagonally.”). Smart Titles works the same way in every module — see the Smart Titles tutorial for how it works.
Export Your Puzzle
Export the puzzle and its solution as PNG, JPG, SVG, or PDF, print-ready at your book’s trim size — Puzzle Book Studio (Productivity) auto-paginates the solution set to the back of the book, matched to each puzzle by ID. With the Interactive add-on you can also export JSON and interactive PDF for fill-in-place solving, build Puzzle Slides for a play-in-presentation deck, and publish Online Play for web-based solving.
Outcome
You can now create individual Number Blocks puzzles with matching solutions, style them, title them, and
export them for print or — with the Interactive add-on — interactive and web play. To produce a whole book
of unique puzzles from saved settings, use Time Saver, and assemble finished or mixed books in Puzzle Book
Studio (Productivity edition).
To style the puzzle, set up Smart Titles, batch with Time Saver, or build books, use the shared tutorials
below rather than repeating those steps here.
FAQ
Which edition do I need to batch-create Number Blocks puzzles?
Productivity, which adds Time Saver for batch generation plus unlimited / mixed-set Puzzle Book Studio. Creative makes and styles individual puzzles and a single-set book.
Can I make my Number Blocks puzzles interactive for my website or a live lesson?
Yes, with the Interactive add-on: it unlocks interactive PDF, Puzzle Slides for presenting, and Online Play for web-based solving, on top of Creative or Productivity.
What grid sizes and difficulties can I generate?
Nine grid sizes from 5 × 5 up to 11 × 11 (plus the 5 × 10 and 10 × 5 layouts), each in Easy, Medium, or Hard.
Can I re-theme the numbers into images or symbols?
No — Number Blocks does not support content variation. The digits are fixed puzzle logic, not customizable content, in every edition.
Do I need Time Saver to build a Number Blocks book?
No. Creative already includes single-set Puzzle Book Studio, so you can build one complete book from a single settings pass. Time Saver (Productivity) is for producing many puzzles at once or combining multiple sets or types into one book.
What formats can I export?
PNG, JPG, SVG, and PDF in every edition; with the Interactive add-on, also JSON, interactive PDF, and Puzzle Slides, plus publishing to Online Play.