Rittai Picross (3D Picross) comes out soon, next week in Japan soon. I got an early feel for how it works and even though Picross is in the title Rittai Picross is quite different from Picross DS.
Standard Picross has players fill spaces on an empty grid based on numeric hints. Rittai Picross gives you a rectangular solid with numeric clues written on blocks. You can rotate the solid by dragging the stylus to get a feel for the object.
See the 4 in the picture? That means the column has four blocks. Since there are only four blocks remaining you can paint them by holding the L button and right on the D-pad (lefties can hold R and B) and then tap them to make them change color. Color all of the correct blocks and the puzzle is solved!
The challenge in Rittai Picross comes from breaking the extra blocks that don’t make up the object. You can smash them with a hammer which is activated by holding L and up on the D-pad. When you see a row or column with the number zero it’s hammer time. These areas are good starting points when trying to crack a puzzle since these areas don’t have any blocks in them. After the empty rows are gone you can focus on the blocks that are out of place like the gray 1 in the top right hand corner of the object. Why the 1? The column in the back has six blocks, all of which are highlighted. The row with the 1 only has one block and since the block in the back is already painted the remaining, unpainted clue block isn’t part of the final picture.
If you mistakenly break a block that should be in the 3D object “miss” pops up before a cracked block automatically reappears in its place. It’s good to know Rittai Picross doesn’t restart the puzzle after a single mistake, but placing broken blocks makes the puzzles much easier.
By the way, did you figure out what the object in the puzzle is? Find out below…
