Unsure about the mixed response to this one, it's just Picross with a cute coat of paint on it! It's pretty standard, although with a very slight RPG element to it. Enemies charge up attacks that you can stop by completing a line on the puzzle, and you can also switch targets as you'll end up having to balance up to three enemies. I never got close to dying, but I can see newer Picross players struggling, but maybe this would push them to figure puzzles out faster. There's also optional puzzles where you'll redo already-completed puzzles but you need to do it without making a mistake, or in a time limit, or some other challenge.

It's not the most amazing spin on Picross, but I welcome it as a long-time fan. The boss music really reminded me of old flash games for some reason?

All puzzles completed. PictoQuest is a decently entertaining picross game, probably a little on the easier end of the scale. The RPG theme promises quite a lot, but ultimately adds little to the game - I didn't find it necessary to make use of the available items at any point, especially as they'd only have served to make the puzzles easier - which is somewhat contrary to the point of solving them! Ultimately, it's still picross so if you enjoy this type of puzzle you'll have a good time with this, but, while some competitor games innovate with multiple colours, multi-part puzzles or other variants, PictoQuest doesn't really push the genre in any significant way.

I truly do not know why I keep playing these games. I am the annoying sort of blurty person that likes to answer questions I know the answer to for the dopamine hit, and I've come to realize that nonogram games are a similar kind of low-hanging fruit. The basic rules are interesting, and the way different-sized puzzles makes you revamp your mental math can be a nice change of pace, but ultimately it's just mind-numbingly repetitive, applying the same algorithm over and over until the thing is all filled up. I know they are technically puzzles, but it is like a Rubik's Cube in that as soon as you know the gameplan, the actual act of solving is more of a formality than anything.

I have seldomly been really challenged by a Picross-like, the kinds that really make you work your tail off for every cell, but as you might guess by the chibi artstyle, PictoQuest does not provide that. What it does provide is a warm thematic wrapper over the core Xs and Os gameplay, with the basic plot of a cute little quest, a health bar (under threat of enemy attacks, as their ATB meter fills) cleverly disguising a timer mechanic, bonus levels masquerade as side-quests, and so on. It is, in short, what you expect.

What it attempts, though, it does largely succeed at. PictoQuest is visually tidy and colorful, making playful twists on all sorts of fantasy tropes, and the music is relaxing and unintrusive, setting it apart from the vast majority of nonogram games. A broken-English translation of already hammy dialogue is worth a chuckle here and there. The game can, occasionally, distract you from the soul-crushing tedium of what you are doing, and perhaps that is the best I can say of it.

Pictoquest is a simple picross game mixed with light RPG elements. You buy items and fight monsters in a timely manner so you
don't lose all your health and die. It makes for a challenging picross experience and as a picross fan, I feel like it was a
nice touch to give a little more life to the puzzles. It's not entirely challenging, but as you go along the puzzles do get bigger
and start to feel a little more rewarding to finish. There is no need to care about the story here, just enjoyable fun puzzles
with around 10 hours of content. It's one of the better picross games I have ever played.

O...okay. That's a game. About picross seems like. Did you guys know Greenland sharks have high levels of urea stored in their tissue, which increases their buoyancy. They have pee armor on LMAOOOO. That's a fact. Wanna hear another fact? Picross fuck yeah! Picross RPG? Holy moly! (Note: very light. Barely RPG. In fact it's just a shop and side quests). The shop is ran by a cool dude selling you overpriced basic items. That's rad. The quests are handled by one moron per world who approaches you with dumb requests and the power of picross saves the day. The vibes are there, this is an RPG for sure.

So, seems like "new type of picross just dropped" is selling it generously. You can choose between a male and female form, but they are both companions with their own agency so pick whichever one would look coolest on the map. Game gets pretty unforgiving with errors, mostly apparent with bosses who kill you in 5 mistakes. It's annoying because you start from scratch and I forgor what I did 💀 if you could start everytime with a few tiles progressively unveiled I'd maybe feel like I didn't do big brain moves and thinking for nada.

Did you know: Picross is actually the name of a trademarked series! That never stops anyone from putting "picross game" in their description, though. But technically, games of this sort should be called "nonograms".
Anyway, PictoQuest is a somewhat standard nonogram game with a fantasy aesthetic. What sets it apart are its RPG-like features. Many stages of the game are played against typical RPG monsters like slimes, fire creatures, trolls, and the like. Solving a full line of the puzzle will cause them to lose health; likewise, taking too long to solve a line will result in them attacking you. Various items are available to restore health, reveal hints, solve squares, and slow down enemy attacks.
Unfortunately, the very thing that makes this game unique also serves as its main drawback. The battle elements are fun at first, but quickly become a frustrating nuisance that can distract you from the puzzles. These sorts of games are usually designed to be solved at one's own pace, not at the mercy of an arbitrary health bar. And if you do happen to run out of health during a puzzle, you have to start the entire thing over with no progress saved. Imagine having 90% of a puzzle done, making one mistake, and having to re-complete the entire thing.
The translation on this game is pretty bad, too. It almost feels machine translated. This is an E rated game, but one of the enemies says "damn" at one point, and another one says "cloaca". I am not kidding.
The art style is alright, I guess. That's really the only thing I can say in its favor that I can't say about any other nonogram or Picross game. If you're really desperate for a puzzle game and you have two bucks to spend on a Switch sale, this is one of the options you have.