03 March 2011

"SokoBig", by Howard Abed



I know two collections of SokoBig. Both were published by Howard Abed in his website during 2001. 

 
"Old" SokoBig - 80 levels (March 2001)
 
First, he has published a collection of 80 levels, on February or March 2001: is the collection "old" SokoBig. SokoBig-80 levels can still be downloaded from the Howard Abed website, on Internet Archive:

http://replay.waybackmachine.org/20010424071935/http://www.geocities.com/sokoban2000/sokobig.txt

 
"New" SokoBig - 70 levels (November 2001)
 
By late 2001, shortly before the website of Howard Abed was closed, by November or December, he published a major remodeling of the collection, with only 70 levels. I've downloaded this collection of Howard Abed website, before it was closed. You can download this "new" SokoBig-70 levels here:

- "New" SokoBig - 70 levels

(Between these two series, there were other minor remodeling: e.g., I have downloaded also a SokoBig-82 levels, published shortly after SokoBig-80.)


Remodeled levels not included in SokoBig-70
 
In the section "Development levels" could be downloaded the level 69, which was not published in SokoBig-70 levels. I have two versions, 69b and 69c:

- SokoBig 69b
- SokoBig 69c 
(old URL: http://www.geocities.com/sokoban2000/devlev.txt)

In January 2002, I visited the Howard Abed website, but it was closed. Thanks to Google cached, I've downloaded 5 new remodels of levels 4, 11, 16, 27 and 31:

- SokoBig 4a, 11a, 16b, 27a and 31a
(old URL: http://www.geocities.com/sokoban2000/newsokobig.txt)


The table below provides the correspondences between the two collections SB-80 and SB-70:


Other levels

In the François Marques website can be downloaded 62e and 62z levels, as part of "old" SokoBig-80 levels:

- SokoBig 62e
- SokoBig 62z


Howard Abed has hosted his website on different servers. These are the URLs that I know:

http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/eabed
http://members.xoom.com/Howardabed/
http://sokoban.cjb.net
http://www.geocities.com/sokoban2000/index.html

The website of Howard closed in December 2001, and soon after Howard left the SokoBig project.

In September 2002, Evgeny Grigoriev reported it in Yahoo! Groups (September 10, 2002):

-----------------
Hello Eric

Howard has stopped development of levels,
Has removed the Web Site and email
:(
He informed me on it.
But it is possible he still will return in SokoBan.

I and my friend have solved All levels from set SokoBig

bye

> Where is Howard Abed website??? Who has the solutions of all the
very big sokoban puzzzled of Abed???
>
> Eric Tchong

-------------------

I'm an admirer of Howard Abed, who was a pioneer in many things. I do not know why he left Sokoban, but hopefully we can see his new works.

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