Nintendo Media Summit: Picross hands-on (DS)
by Colin Torretta 
{ May 28th 2007 at 5:40PM }
Although Picross has been available for a while in Japan, the North American release is coming out on July 30th, and Nintendo had it on display at last week's Nintendo Media Summit. The premise behind Picross is kind of hard to explain, but I'll try anyway: It's a type of mathematical crossword puzzle with an image-based theme. It kind of feels like Minesweeper at times but kind of feels like Suduko at other times. As you can see from the screenshots below, you are given a grid with numbers on the outside edge. You have to figure out from the numbers what pattern of squares should be filled in on the grid, with mistakes costing you big penalties on your overall time score. Once you've completed the puzzle, you reveal a picture in the pattern on the grid. The larger the grid, the more complex the picture.
You can also make your own puzzles easily; all you have to do is draw an image and the game will turn it into a puzzle for you. If you want more control, you can also create a puzzle by hand. You can even trade puzzles with friends over the wireless connection and Nintendo promises additional puzzles will be made available for download for free, which is always a nice plus.
The game was a lot of fun and the ability to draw your own puzzles was a nice touch. Puzzle fans, look for this game when it comes out on July 30th.
Gallery: Picross
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Borat @ May 28th 2007 5:58PM
I'm playing it right now (European version) and I can truly say that is a brilliant puzzle game. You can play online against other people and you can even download extra puzzles...the puzzles from Mario's Picross are available for download right now.
I highly recommend the game.
Ethan Duffy @ May 28th 2007 6:11PM
Agree with the chap above, it's made for the DS, easy to pick up, enjoyable and you're done in minutes. And you get a pretty picture at the end. And it's a flexible game that belies it's simplicity, with the aforementioned online sharing and competing and some quick time attack making it varied enough to hold your attention.
Joe @ May 28th 2007 6:28PM
There is one huge problem with the game though (well, two really). The whole zooming in mechanic for the bigger puzzles doesn't work really well. In addition, the scrolling around the puzzle is a huge pain, and quite often I'll press the wrong direction on the D-pad and make an X instead of filling in a box.
Theres a Palm OS picross called PictureLogic that I have on my Treo that works a whole lot better than the DS one (and plus, I have my cellphone with me a lot more often than I have my DS on me.)
Joe @ May 28th 2007 6:28PM
The online competing part though is pretty awesome.
Rubang B @ May 28th 2007 7:09PM
I played me the hell out of some Mario's Picross on the original Game Boy back in the day and I loved it. I will be buying this game posthaste!
Kenofthedead @ May 28th 2007 11:08PM
It really is a great game, perfect for puzzle lovers.
Nintendo put up a nice video tutorial to explain the basics by the road.
http://www.touchgenerations.com/enGB/games/picross/how_to_play.php
jmtb02 @ May 28th 2007 11:17PM
ArmorGames as a version of Picross, if you feel inclined to try out a version. Sure, it's not a DS game, but it's still Picross.
http://www.armorgames.com/games/armorpicross.html
BPM @ May 29th 2007 12:15AM
Now I finally understand Picross, having tried that online version jmtb02 linked to. Quite fun, it is.
t_m @ May 29th 2007 2:58AM
I remember playing with an online version a year or so ago, it was great.
There is also a gba game called Guru Logic Chmp that is very similar, though they have tweaked it to work better on gba controls.
m0m0 @ May 29th 2007 11:41AM
love picross? try this: http://www.puzzlehome.com/ its basically the same but on a much larger size and complexity. i've literally played for hundreds of hours.