Pick Pack Pup is a grid-matching puzzle game that twists the traditional premise by having packages be sent only on a verification click by the user. The more packages on screen at once, the more points you get for shipping them. I bleed Bejeweled gems, so this was right up my wheelhouse. And the small mechanical change of cashing in matches felt novel enough to warrant its existence.

While entirely free of crank integration gameplay-wise, it offers very cute story sections presented as newspaper reels that you page-turn by using the crank. Nothing crazy, but it complimented the quirky aesthetic that they’re going for in this anthropomorphic world. The levels were broken up into time-based, move-based, and item-based requirements, and even had a lil Tetris homage. It wasn’t a hard game, so not letting player get too comfortable with level patterns kept the pace nice and brisk.

For those aching for that matching-game kick on Playdate, Pick Pack Pup also offers an infinity mode, chill mode, and danger zone. Just about every variation possible for stress-lovers and lazy-players are available for people who are particularly fond of the genre. For what it is I enjoyed my time with it. The grid perhaps could have been bigger by default, but that’s a minor nitpick of mine. Given its genre popularity it’s almost a given that something like Pick Pack Pup would be made for the Playdate, however it does provide that signature Playdate twist that sets it apart from mindless copycats, if only just slightly.

Another week another Playdate game, with the first of week three's entries being Pick Pack Pup, a match-3 game where you package items in a modern warehouse setting. The game uses the crank to scroll through its story, with the D-pad and A buttons used for the actual gameplay. The story is pretty cute. It has some fun criticisms of corporate greed while keeping a light hearted tone. The match-3 gameplay is nothing to write home about, and it's actually much easier than most as many levels don't have any way to lose. You simply need to match enough objects to move on to the next level. There are a few that buck this trend and have more puzzle or time limit constraints, but it's still never difficult. If anything, some of the point quotas are high enough to become tedious, as there's never any risk of failure, but it still takes a while to complete the stage. This is made worse by a mechanic where the bottom row of objects will be destroyed on a timer, subtracting from your point score. This only serves to draw out the level even longer, and while there is a mechanic to try and minimize this effect, I found it a bit finicky to pull off. All that aside, I like the gameplay and I like the presentation; so much so that this is probably my favorite Playdate title thus far.