Game: Piczle Cells
Genre: Puzzle, Action
System: Nintendo Switch
Developers | Publishers: Score Studios | RAINYFROG
Age Rating: US E | EU 3+
Price: US $4.99 | UK £4.49 | EU € 4,99
Release Date: June 10th, 2021
Review code used, with many thanks to RAINYFROG
From Score Studios, the creator of the popular Piczle series of logic puzzles, comes this quirky little brain-bender, Piczle Cells.
Move Cells
Piczle Cells is a puzzle game that will challenge you and might involve some hair pulling. Your task is to slide cells on an 8×6 grid and make them collide to combine them into different colours. Three of the same type of cell can merge into a single new cell. You have to end up with one specific cell on the board to clear the puzzle. It looks and sounds like a pretty straightforward premise, however, looks can be deceiving.
Blobs of Goop
You see, the thing with Piczle Cells is that the blobs of goop can only move up or down, left and right on the board. Small cells are green, then there are blue cells and yellow ones as well. Three green cells pushed together to create a blue cell, three blue cells pushed together to create a yellow cell, and three yellow cells create a green cell.
When you move one single cell of the same colour into another cell, these become joined into one mass. The difficulty comes into play as once two cells are formed into a mass they can’t be moved on the board anymore. It’s only when a third cell of the same colour gets pushed into this mass of goop that a new cell colour is formed, allowing it to be pushed around yet again.
Slip and Slide
Cells that can be moved will also slide off the board and appear on the other side, by that I mean if it goes off the board to the left it will appear on the right side of the board again. They can be stopped sliding of the board by using the stationary two cells as one mass to act as a wall and stop the sliding cell in its tracks.
It makes for some brainteaser puzzles as you work out how to combine the colours and move the blobs successfully. Just as you think you have got the hang of the game the developers add in something to shake things up a great deal. Throughout the 100 puzzles, you’ll encounter tough challenges to overcome. Such as walls that both help and hinder your progress. Conveyor belts that push your cells into specific directions, switcher cells, and viruses that are best avoided. Haven’t we had enough of viruses lately?
Visuals and Controls
Piczle Cells is a bright and colourful game with nice animation from the cells as they collide and merge together. It is backed up with some really laidback, chill music, which is great for listening to for lowering the blood pressure that has risen as you solve the puzzles.
Controls are either joy-con or touchscreen. I had better results using the joy-cons as they felt more intuitive than the touchscreen controls to me. A nice added touch is that, during the levels, if you do get stuck you have the ability to rewind moves or simply restart a puzzle.
Conclusion
It took me at least the first ten levels of Piczle Cells to get my head around how the game works. Then along came the levels with walls and obstacles and I was lost again. Having the ability to rewind your moves cuts down the frustration that a wrong move may cause. It also stopped me from doing damage to my Switch. Piczle Cells offers puzzlers an enjoyable and challenging goopy experience.
Final Verdict: I Like It A Lot 