My two regular readers may recall my year-old article on Picross Addiction and the four color minimalist joys of Mario’s Picross. You may also recall a promise of a “part two” that was going to cover the first two games in the Picross e series on 3DS. Well, how about it? Beyond my usual real life excuses, I’ve also beaten Picross e through Picross e4…Twice. Each. So they must be doing something right. Now that Picross e5 just came out, this may be my only chance to write about the series before I fall back into the abyss.
For me, Picross is right in the sweet spot for logic puzzles. “Math plus Deduction equals Picture” tickles my brain in just the right way. Developer Jupiter has been creating Picross games for Nintendo for a while now and I think the e series is near the platonic ideal. For one, it fixes the problems I had with Picross DS. Offering stylus or button control (I prefer buttons), the interface is minimal, but no longer amateurish. Most importantly, the game no longer zooms in for larger puzzles, obscuring the rest of the board. For whatever reason, Picross is much more enjoyable to me when I can see the whole puzzle.
The e series also introduced several new tweaks to speed up and improve play. Even in Mario’s Picross on Gameboy, you could always select an optional hint feature that would reveal a random row and column to get you started (which I recommend avoiding once you get the hang of the game). However, in the Picross e games you can now “wrap around the world” when navigating the board, as well as when you press down either the Fill or X buttons and move around on the board, the game will not write over marks you have already placed. These may sound trivial, but they are huge time savers. Even better though, is the new blue hinting system. Fellow Picross Addict Nich Maragos explains it much better than I, but the short of it is this. With the blue hints, the game is telling you on which rows and columns you should be able to figure out another move. It’s a great way of teaching how to be a better Picross player. I learned several new ways of deducing moves in this series, even though I have been playing these puzzles for a long time.
So if you A) have a 3DS and B) already enjoy Picross and/or C) this series sounds remotely in your wheelhouse, then D) you should definitely try it out. But which one should you get? If you are new to Picross, I recommend the first one, Picross e. Its beginning puzzles are little easier, so it seems the best way to dip your toes into the water. If you have played other Picross games, then try Picross e3 first. It has a great 2nd mode called Mega Picross, which makes the math of the puzzles more challenging. Some of the numbers on the top and on the left of the puzzle will now cover two rows instead of just one. Mega Picross takes awhile to wrap your brain around, but it is very satisfying when you start to understand the change.
As far at the other games go, Picross e2 offers a Micross mode, which is a series of smaller puzzles that, when put together, form various famous works of art. Picross e4 offers a sampling of all the modes in the previous games, the ability to play all the puzzles in free or normal mode (I prefer free, where the game does not tell you if you have made a mistake), as well as a selection of larger 20×15 puzzles. If any one of these games clicks for you, you’ll probably end up purchasing the lot, soon enough. I do hope they introduce color puzzles in a future installment. It’s the only thing I can think of that I could want.
If you do end up trying Picross or if you already have played the Picross e series, here’s something you can try on a second playthrough. Try solving the puzzles only using the Fill marks, and not the X marks. It often ends up being too hard to maintain for a whole level, but it’s a fun challenge and you can solve more of the puzzles this way than you might think.
Cheers,
Ben