Picross puzzles – or griddlers, nonograms or pic-a-pix, as you might know them instead – are a popular type of picture-based puzzle, and there’s a range of them available on Nintendo Switch.
These puzzles are grid based, giving you a series of numbers around two edges of a square. Those numbers tell you how many smaller squares in the grid should be coloured in. And, when filled in correctly, the whole grid usually reveals a picture. They can be very easy or very challenging, but if you’re the type of person who enjoys logic puzzles, they’re very satisfying to complete. If you’re looking for the best picross games on Switch, you’ve come to the right place.
There’s a large about of picross games available on Nintendo’s handheld, but how are you supposed to know which ones are worth your time? Well, click on through our list, where we’ve picked out five of the best. We’ve chosen a varied selection, from pure puzzle-based games to ones framed around a story mode. But if you’re a picross fan, we’re sure you’ll love them all. Read on to see the best picross games on Switch.
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1. Pixel Puzzle Makeout League
Pixel Puzzle Makeout League ticks boxes in two niche game genres: picross and dating simulators. Yes, you read that right – this is a picross game framed around a story about dating. And not just any old regular dating: superhero dating. Pixel Puzzle Makeout League tells the story of four superheroes, all with puzzle-based abilities. You play as Pixel Girl who, unsurprisingly, has the special ability of solving picross puzzles.
The blend of storytelling and puzzle solving here is great, though if you’d rather just focus on the picross aspect, you can skip through the story. We recommend you don’t though – it’s a fun narrative that’ll have you chuckling throughout. And the puzzles are never more than a minute or two away. The puzzles start out easy enough but soon become challenging, so even the most seasoned of picross fans will have enough of a challenge. It’s something a bit different, but that’s what makes Pixel Puzzle Makeout League one of the best picross games on Switch.
Read more about Pixel Puzzle Makeout League
2. Murder By Numbers
Murder By Numbers is another story-driven picross game, but this time the story it tells is based around a murder mystery. You take on the role of Honor, a young woman just sacked from her acting role. But something doesn’t seem right; minutes after firing you, your boss is murdered. And now, wherever you go, you seem to be one minute away from a terrible crime. As is often the case in video games, you end up mixed up in something you’d be better off staying out of. But with the help of your trusty robot companion SCOUT – who has his own mysteries – you’ll end up working towards solving a number of crimes.
But where do the picross puzzles come in, you ask? Well, as you examine each crime scene, you’ll need to solve a picross for each clue or piece of evidence you come across. It ties together quite nicely, and means you have a good rhythm of story and puzzle sections. The puzzles themselves are excellently designed, but it’s the storytelling that sets Murder By Numbers apart. It’s without a doubt one of the best picross games on Switch.
Read our review of Murder By Numbers
3. Piczle Cross Adventure
Here’s yet another picross game on Switch that packs in a narrative alongside its puzzles. Piczle Cross Adventure is set out like an old-school 2D adventure game. You’re free to explore a world and interact with characters – but dotted around are ‘glitched’ items. You see, the evil _SCORE has wreaked havoc, turning all manner of things into pixels. That’s where you come in. By interacting with these objects, and solving a picross puzzle for each one, you can begin to restore normality to the world.
We do enjoy a good story alongside our puzzles, and Piczle Cross Adventure manages to be heartily entertaining. There’s a huge amount of puzzles to play through too, and you’re never more than a few minutes away from one. Needless to say, if you’re looking for the best picross games on Switch, this ought to be on your list.
Read our review of Piczle Cross Adventure
4. Picross S Series
Prefer your picross games to be free of any ‘bloat’? Then the Picross S series is probably for you. With eight games now in the series, these ever-popular titles focus only on what’s important: picross puzzles.
That’s right – you’ll not find any narrative, character building or storytelling here. This series of games is all about giving players nothing but puzzles. Each title in the series has hundreds of picross puzzles to work your way through, all of varying difficulty. The titles introduce various twists on the basic puzzle form, too, by adding in colour-based puzzles and new types of challenges. There’s weeks, or even months, of content in any one of the Picross S titles. If you’re looking for the best pure picross games on Switch, we can’t recommend these enough.
5. Depixtion
The last game on our list of best picross games on Switch is definitely not the least. Like the Picross S series, Depixtion isn’t concerned with telling a story or presenting cute characters. This is another title all about the puzzles. But it does have its own twist: Depixtion is filled with colour-based puzzles, but in order to reveal the full picture, you’ll need to complete three puzzles; one for each primary colour.
Once you’ve each of the red, yellow and blue puzzles, they’ll be overlaid on top of each other, with the colours blending together to create a full, multi-coloured image. It’s a neat idea, and it means that there’s 3x the amount of picross puzzles to solve here as there are pictures to complete. Each one’s a lot of fun, and the twist to gameplay really makes Depixtion feel like something different.
