Picross is great, but this one hasn't aged the greatest. And despite being released closer in time to the 3DS games, it is an old-school Picross at heart. Perhaps Jupiter wasn't quite sure of what to do with the Picross "formula", and/or maybe by Nintendo's request had to utilize various DS features that don't really make that much sense here otherwise (Rumble Pak functionality?). Thankfully, they've since figured out a solid set of modes and options with the 3DS and Switch games, but much of what they added to this one is very hit or miss, as cute as they may be.

The level editor, downloadable packs, online and local multiplayer, introduction of touch controls (with both toggle and hold!), unique level themes and animations for every individual puzzle, rock. The devs took care to really flesh out these features and additional bits of flavor to make the game as accessible as possible. Yet there's a lot of crust. Too much for one pizza. For example, the UI is pretty dated and has this very confused sense of design. Almost as if it was trying to be a pseudo-desktop app with its motifs. There's an X button that shows up with yes or no questions that serves zero purpose of its own. I appreciate being given the option between "Yes", "No", and "Fuck Off", but these weird "extra" things the game does are silly. The minigames are in the same boat, they suck and really hammer in that early-DS-must-use-touchscreen-technology-at-all-costs problem. Though I guess the sketch one is alright and holds some relevance to Picross.

Worse than those though, while the hint number auto check was added to this game (I think?), it only works when you close off all surrounding squares or solve a line of numbers completely. So it becomes rather easy to miss a spot and screw up elsewhere on larger puzzles, especially when a level's theme is visually noisy and especially when the zoom feature gives you insane tunnel vision. Unfortunately, the zoom tool is the only option you have for tackling the larger puzzles with touch controls as well. I honestly found this made touch controls unusable on the 20x20 and 25x20 Free puzzles because it really made making mistakes (and having to fix them) so much more common. And as for visually noisy themes, some of the levels have terrible color choices for the overlays/Try It Out mode, which doesn't help.

Also the music sucks, it's bootleg Pokémon crap that drives you insane after you've heard it loop twice. There are a few nice themes, notably in isolation and not on repeat, but there were three Now Production composers on this, so I'm not sure why the music is as shallow as it is. Picross games usually don't have that much music, so becoming grating is always a possibility, but I can easily listen to Yuka Tsujiyoko's work in the e and S games for hours and Toshiyuki Ueno's songs in the SNES and GB games are great too.

Overall, the sleekness of this game is nice, but Jupiter couldn't quite get it as sleek enough here like they have since. Normal and Free modes are simply not diverse enough and many of the additional adds don't serve to keep me playing much more than they have (I'm looking at you, Daily Picross). Perhaps this is part of the reason it's taken me almost a decade of playing this on and off to 100% it, but hey it's also the first Picross I've finished. So yay!

Shame that it's arguably one of the weakest in the series, because it definitely tries not to be. It's still great!