PictoQuest: The Cursed Grids (Nintendo Switch) Review

 PictoQuest: The Cursed Grids (Nintendo Switch) 6.5/10

Hello everyone and welcome back to another video game review. PictoQuest: The Cursed Grids was released on August 8, 2019 for the Nintendo Switch and PC. The game was developed by NanoPiko and published by Plug in Digital.

As some of you may know, I’m a huge picross fan. A lot of people enjoy simple crosswords or sudoku. But not me. Picross puzzles are logic puzzles where you have to fill in a grid according to numbers on the side of the puzzle. By filling in the grid, you’ll create a picture. Ever since playing Pokemon Picross for the 3DS, I’ve been into these damn things. This game spins these logic puzzles differently by adding light RPG elements to it. This is a children’s game but I couldn’t help but enjoy myself with it. However, I did run across some problems that hold it from being a genuinely good game. Let’s begin.

The story follows Floh (the blue haired boy) and Arvel (the red haired girl) as they go on a quest to recover the missing grids that've been stolen by the evil Moonface. Floh’s reason for going on the adventure is for the sake of adventure and to stop Moonface. Arvel’s reason for going on the adventure is that her late mother created most of the grids, so she feels she needs to recover them to honor her mother’s memory. At the start of the game, you can choose which character you want to play as. There’s no difference in gameplay depending on who you choose. All the puzzles will be the same. I chose Arvel because she has a better reason to embark on this quest than Floh. Story is straightforward and easy to follow.

So gameplay is what really stuck out to me. You have your normal picross puzzles and you can use a couple of items to help you fill it out. The thing is though, you have a health meter. When you first start the game, you’ll start off with three hearts. The reason you have a health bar is because you’re fighting monsters as you do the picross grid. Every time you clear out a column/row on the grid, you’ll deal damage to the monster you’re fighting. If you take too long clearing out the lines, then you’ll have a chance of taking damage from the monster(s). I really like this spin on the picross puzzles because it makes them more fun and challenging. After you complete a grid, you’ll earn gold. You can use the gold to buy stuff from the merchant Sellork. He has shops located in every region, so you won’t have to travel far to get to him. At his shop you can buy half heart potions, full heart potions, health upgrades, ice attacks (which freezes your opponent), fire attacks (which lights up one row and one column, showing you which squares you can fill up), and lightning attacks (which reveals any squares in a 3x3 square, instantly marking any squares). I usually found myself using the full heart potion, ice attack, and lightning attack the most.

How you move about each grid is through an over world (similar to that of Super Mario World). As you travel through the land of Pictoria, you’ll encounter people and even creatures that’ll be needing your help. These are side missions that are required for 100% completion. These side missions consist of you doing a grid that you have already beaten but with a restriction on them (complete within the time limit, don’t make any mistakes, don’t use items, etc). A couple of these were a decent challenge, but there were a select few that kicked my ass a couple of times (such as the last side mission in Furnace Fields). I believe there’s ten regions in the game and I think there are ten grids per region, so there’s plenty of puzzles to go around. As you progress through the game, the puzzles will get increasingly more challenging. You start off with 5x5 grids, then they progress to 10x10, 15x15, 15x20, and 20x20 grids.

I really like the design of the characters and creatures. Everything is really cute and adorable (especially the slime creatures). I also like Floh, Arvel, Moonface, Sellork, and a couple of the other side character’s designs. I also liked the pictures that come about after you finish a grid, especially the 20x20 grids. I like the overall look of the overworld map. The overworld looks like a really old, drawn map which fits in with the fantasy setting.

Music is ok at best. Each region has a different theme for each grid that’s within the region. These can get really repetitive and really annoying fast. About 80% of my time playing, I had the game muted and I was playing my own music. Who knew playing metal can fit in so well with a children’s puzzle game lmao.

Honestly, my only problem with the game was that there wasn’t enough content for me. Yeah sure I dropped roughly 10 hours into this game, but I wish there was more. I also wish there were more items and tricks that both you and your opponent could use, but it’s a decent start I guess.

Overall, I had fun with the game. It’s not the greatest thing ever, but it certainly entertained me. I can only recommend this to people that like picross puzzles. If you don’t like logic puzzles like these, then you probably won’t enjoy it like I did. Until my next review, stay safe out there.

Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time.

This is Zorgak, signing off.