As a Picross expert, I can say that this game is alright.

I've played so much Picross. Seriously, just...so much. Mario Picross, Picross 3D, Picross e1-6, etc. I have a problem. My 3DS is basically a Picross factory.

So if you've played the Picross e-series, this is pretty much that, with some new stuff layered on top. New stuff including Pokemon 'powers' to use during puzzles, missions, a world map, achievements, and also it's free-to-start did I mention that? It's free-to-start.

You can buy or earn picrites, which are used to extend your energy meter (also there's an energy meter), open access to new areas, and open new party slots. Maybe some other stuff. It hasn't been too overbearing so far though. You can only upgrade your energy meter 5 times before you just have infinite energy, for instance. I've upgraded it 3 times already, after just a few hours of playing. The system also prevents you from buying more than $32 total worth of picrites before you just have everything unlocked. I applaud that, but at the same time, every Picross e-game has been $6, so spending $32 on this game might be a bit much. Though to be fair, I have not seen how much is actually in this game so far. I will say that I've spent 10-15+ hours on every Picross e-game though, easily.

The sad downside of this is that the controls just feel sluggish and slightly laggy compared to the e-games, which is strange. I feel like it takes just a little bit of extra time to mark squares in the puzzle, which has sometimes led to me misclicking on tiles. I have been playing with buttons, not the stylus, so it might be different with a stylus. That being said, I also don't like how you HAVE to use the touch screen to progress things along, even if you choose button controls. It's super annoying. I can't recall any other games that force you to tap the touch screen just to advance dialog or choose 'ok' or something. I've never once used the stylus for any other Picross game, so it's kinda jarring that it's just like 'alright stylus time' now. Why take the extra step to program in 'please use the stylus' when you could just say 'oh hey you tapped the A button, lemme advance this dialog for you bro?'

Overall though, it's a good game. It's more goddamn Picross, and goddamn Picross is a pretty fun thing.

NOW THEY JUST NEED TO BRING PICROSS 3D 2 OVER HERE.

pls

I've been playing a whole lot of this the last 24 hours. I'm new to picross though, never played a picross game before this one. It's a satisfying puzzle format for sure!

Awesome I love Picross. How's the difficulty? I kind of suck at these games even though I love them. Picross 3d was a bit much for me.

There was a pretty good post on gamefaqs about what you can expect if you go the free route with this game. Link

To sum it up, there are a lot of traps that make you waste your Picrites and you can expect to run into a lot of walls for progress. You generally want to save your Picrites to unlock new zones since you'll run out of puzzles before you run out of energy.

Here are also some passwords that people found. Link

I'm enjoying the game so far but I'll second Dietomaha's complaints about the controls. I did unlock a new puzzle type with the numbers that take up 2 rows/columns. I'm interested in doing more of those but from what I've read, those puzzles don't give out any Picrites.

I've only put a few hours in, and while I think the puzzles are solid enough, the tiny trickle of picrites that you get for completing puzzles seems like it'll really limit one's ability to play the game without just putting out cash for it pretty quickly. What seems especially weird is that you get even fewer numbers of picrites if you *don't* use the pokémon abilities it just seems so counter intuitive to reward people less for not using the hint system.

At least the energy system is leaps and bounds better than the one in Pokémon Shuffle.

I got pretty good at Picross and burned through the whole Picross e series in like a couple weeks earlier this year. I even went back to Mario Picross and replayed a good chunk of that afterwards (which, incidentally, is also way less responsive than Picross e).

It will be weird to not be able to just cruise through this one.

@terach Thanks for that, I may have inadvertently fucked myself by buying energy meter extensions... Oh well!

This is my first picross game - I really like it so far. It helps knowing what the pokemon look like so I can sort of guess at what pokemon I'm creating during a picture. But the forced stylus control on menus with button control chosen in game is really annoying.

I highly suggest if you guys are new to Picross to go pick up a Picross e game. They're $6 a pop on the eShop, they all have a ton of puzzles in them, and you don't have to deal with any silly f2p mechanics. Plus the control is a bit tighter.

After sinking some more time into the game, I have a few additional impressions.

The Picrite mechanic straight sucks the further you get into the game. You get so few for doing missions (literally 5-6 usually), but then you need 100+ to open new areas and add party slots and such. Since you need to do every mission you can, and some missions require you to set 3 (or more, presumably) pokemon for the puzzle, you kinda hit a wall. Really I don't know how to earn more picrites other than doing the daily training for like a month to open the next area, which Fucking Sucks. You can only get picrites from missions the first time, so you're stuck relying on the training if you're at a point where you can't progress. Granted, maybe that's why they called this 'free-to-start' because they knew everyone would inevitably hit a wall, but it still is pretty shitty.

So yeah, I highly recommend picking up a Picross e game if you like this. I appreciate the fact that they've tried to add a gameyness to Picross, but the f2p-ness of it (hehe p-ness heh) kinda ruins it. My plan is to pay $6, the standard price of a Picross e game, and see how far that gets me. Maybe a bit more, since there is more to this than the standard Picross games.

All fun and games until you run out of picrites. Then it sucks.

It's 3D or go home for me. I can't go back to regular old 2D picross after playing Picross 3D.

After running into a f2p-wall in this game, I decided to check Picross e instead. Man, what a better game that is. Seems like there's a lot of puzzles too.

@dietomaha: The energy stuff was bad, but the "Please use the stylus" thing was definitely the dealbreaker.

This man speaks the truth.

I started it. It's alright! I loved 3D so much, but that was my first Picross so I wasn't sure about the traditional ones. So it was nice to be able to try this for free and realize I should dig into the e series.

seriously, save your picrites for unlocking new levels, don't worry about new slots or meter extentions until you absolutely need them or you will get stuck

I too have a Picross problem (played all other Nintendo releases), and I'm actually on the positive side of the fence, in favor of Pokemon Picross. I've been playing it since release, and I surprisingly like that the Picrite economy forces me to play a short daily training every day. And the fact that I have to beat the challenge time to get an extra two currency has made me get faster at completing puzzles. It's a nice, long, daily drip feed of Picross with the occasional day or two where I've had enough money to buy an eight-ball of puzzles where I can go into a frenzy, much like a drug addict.

I will admit that some days it takes a HEAVY amount of restraint to not spend the full $30 of actual money (the technical full purchase price) on the game, but I think the fun truly comes out of trying to complete the achievements and level challenges to squeeze every drop of currency into buying the next set of puzzles. I will admit to paying $5 for the two "on sale/best value" Picrite packs, mostly to get the Mega Pencil, since saving up 500 Picrites is insane. I can easily justify spending $1 less than I spent on one Picross E set.

Oh, and there are Pokemon.