Picranium – An Interesting New Game

I’m always looking for what’s new on Marketplace and today I played around with Picranium which is available as a lite app for free or $2.99 to unlock all of the levels. It’s a logic game that closely resembles minesweeper with a bit of soduko mixed in. Here’s how it works. You have numbers on the top and left side of the grid. Those numbers tell you how many boxes there are in each row or column. So, for example, if you have a 5×5 grid and the number at top is five that means you can check off all of the boxes in that column. If the number consists of a lesser number, like 1, then there’s only one box in that column. The solution will come pretty quick to anyone who has played minesweeper. Now the number can also be two numbers like “11” which means that there are two total boxes but they are separated by an empty box whereas the number ‘2’ would delineate 2 adjacent boxes. So using logic, if you have a grid with 5 rows and the number ‘111’ appear you know that the row consists of “box, empty, box, empty, box”. The end result is a very nice challenge that reminds me a lot of playing Meon for the first time and quickly getting hooked. It’s a nice play on some older games but it’s a fresh take on the concept.

One bit of a warning – when you get to the higher levels they have larger grids and the game begins zoomed in so part of the screen is cut off. You have the option to leave it at that zoom level and swipe to see more of the board or to hit the zoom button (or menu and then zoom) to zoom out to see more of the board. This lets you determine how large you like the board and isn’t a bug (even though I thought it was and apologetically drove the MS Certification Team crazy today because of this:)).

So give the lite version a go and be prepared to shell out a cup of coffee once you’re good and hooked. If you were a fan of Meon or soduko or minesweeper it’s definitely worth trying. And for the record I’m not into soduko at all and that hasn’t hindered my quick addiction for this game:)