Pokémon Picross

i'm spending this review space to brag that i 100%ed this game while spending no money. iirc the math means you have to play for over a year (as in, playing like ~400 days total due to daily challenges) to accomplish it, with imperfect play increasing the length it would take.

it's a bit of a silly task and i probably would've enjoyed the game more if i just shelled out the 20 or so bucks that makes the game give you infinite energy (and hence just making it a normal picross game)... but on the other hand having to limit myself and pay heavy attention to all the levels made it so i actually started to use some of the pokémon powers, even though i initially disliked them as a picross purist. if i payed the $20 early, i never would've used them, since i felt like they made the levels "too easy"–instead, they became a useful resource to avoid mistakes over the slow grind.

did i enjoy my time? sssssure. i suppose it was fun enough. 3ds logs my time as over 100 hours, so this is my most played 3ds game. go figure.

as a note, i will say i don't think it's fair to critique this game much for "microtransactions." it's been a while since i checked, but iirc spending 20 or 30 dollars in the game store means you basically "unlock" the game entirely with infinite energy. so it's more that you can choose to play a slow free to play version, or pay in the game itself and get a full-priced, full version with no waiting. maybe that could be considered sneaky...? idk, i quickly realized how you can just spend a certain amount to make the game a normal picross game. i just didn't do it. because i'm stupid.