Having long been a fan of the Picross series since its earlier days, I’ve spent quite a lot of time now contemplating nonogram puzzles over the years. I do remember at one point playing an even more challenging 3D version of the game, Picross 3D, back on the DS, and in some ways have always wondered why it hasn’t made its way to the Switch at some point. Having now played Voxelgram 2, I think I’ve gotten more insight into the challenge behind that potential conversion and why there may be some hesitation to bring it over.

In many ways, if you’re already familiar with the rules behind Picross, and the meaning of the numbers on either axis, you’ve got an idea of what’s in store for you with this version. Of course, the challenge is now you’re trying to think and work on puzzles in three dimensions rather than only two. Aside from the difficulties that presents to the player, trying to work through and conceptualize which blocks need to be colored or knocked out, the interface itself can be tricky as you’re trying to rotate and even drill down into objects to help try to get everything in order to properly match the ultimate target form.

While I’d say that Voxelgram 2 takes up this task pretty admirably, it’s also clear that not quite all of the bugs are out of the system, even if to some degree the challenge may be to properly set the end user up for success in the first place. Especially when moving between layers, keeping track of where things are, and how everything is oriented, can be a challenge. Similarly, at times simply understanding which block you currently have highlighted, or aligning everything so that you’re able to move on the axis you’re trying to make changes to, can be aggravatingly cumbersome. In theory, the touchscreen controls would be more intuitive than using a controller, but with some patience and taking things a little more slowly I did find the controller to be more consistently capable. The touchscreen is generally workable, but I also found its behavior to sometimes be unexpected and a bit erratic, making the more reasonably-consistent controller option the better of the two for me.

In the end, this may be a bit of a niche puzzler, whether because Picross-style puzzles in general can be intimidating, or simply the fact that tackling them in 3D is easy to understand as being quite a bit tougher. While I wouldn’t say the controls for manipulating the puzzle objects are necessarily ideal, and they do take a little time to get used to, I would say that they’re still functional and at least don’t often actively get in your way. Perhaps if the touchscreen controls were a little more refined it would be a different story, but for now this and its predecessor remain the only options on the eShop, so you’ll need to take that into consideration if you’re intrigued by this sort of challenging play.