Review: PICROSS S GENESIS & Master System Edition – Picross X SEGA Could Have Been More

SAY-GUH.

It’s rather impressive how much mileage Nintendo and Jupiter Corporation have managed to get out of the Picross franchise. The beloved number puzzle series has been going for a couple decades now, while the core gameplay all along the way has remained almost completely stagnant. Though the ‘main’ games have been entertaining enough in their own right, the most memorable releases have always been the crossovers with popular franchises. Well known IP like Pokémon, Zelda, and *checks notes* Overlord have been represented in Picross games over the years, and now the latest in this line of spinoffs has arrived with Picross S Genesis & Master System Edition. It’s absolutely nothing new, but hey, how cool is it that Sonic can be in a puzzle?

The core gameplay is exactly the same with this entry, as you’re tasked with utilizing an intimidating series of numbers to tease out a pixel art drawing. Using the numbers along the sides of the rows and columns, you systematically move through the puzzle to find areas where you can either fill in a cell or mark it off. Often, you can’t fully complete a row or column the first time you come across it, so you repeatedly must circle back to partially filled areas as you gain more information and the picture becomes more clear. Sure, it sounds about as fun as doing math homework, but Picross manages to be both relaxing and engaging once you get the hang of it, and it can be frightening how easily it draws you in for ‘one more puzzle’ for the twelfth time.

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