April Fools Released: Relic Castle Picross

[catwithnojob]

Hi everyone, Cat here. I've spent the last few weeks reminiscing on the last twelve months, thinking about the future of Relic Castle. The past twelve months, we've been able to jam at the Winter Game Jam, compete in two Iron Mapper trials, the eighth Summer Game Jam, celebrate with our fellow fangame enthusiasts with two Eevee Expos, and everything in between. If I had to pick the most important day of the past 12 months, it would be when I added an emoji of Maxwell the cat to Relic Castle's Discord server.

Reminiscing on my time here led me to one singular thought: I am unhappy with the state of Relic Castle fangames in 2023.

So today, I am announcing a new initiative to bring honor and great success to the Relic Castle website: Picross! No more will Relic Castle be a place for fangames, ROM hacks, and other releases, it's time for Picross to shine!

The far superior game genre, Picross or Nonogram puzzles, or numerous other names, are picture logic puzzles in which cells in a grid must be colored or left blank according to numbers at the side of the grid to reveal a hidden pixel art-like picture. In this puzzle type, the numbers are a form of discrete tomography that measures how many unbroken lines of filled-in squares there are in any given row or column. (Thanks, Wikipedia) Gone are the days where users will be confused with downloading exe files, asking if this game is a rom hack, asking how to play fangames on their phone, installing the fonts or even asking how many gyms there are!

To celebrate this new initiative, please accept this screenshot of our first release:

You can click on the image to open in a new tab. Open the image in your image editor of your choice, and fill it in to reveal the image!

And of course, the credits:

Spoiler: Credits

Picross Puzzle 1 was created by:
Catwithnojob

The puzzle was built with tools provided by:
landofcrispy.com

Special thanks:
Curry
Claybot

Pokémon Essentials was created by:
Flameguru
Poccil (Peter O.)
Maruno

With contributions from:
AvatarMonkeyKirby
Marin
Boushy
MiDas Mike
Brother1440
Near Fantastica
FL.
PinkMan
Genzai Kawakami
Popper
Golisopod User
Rataime
help-14
Savordez
IceGod64
SoundSpawn
Jacob O. Wobbrock
the__end
KitsuneKouta
Venom12
Lisa Anthony
Wachunga
Luka S.J.
and everyone else who helped out

"mkxp-z" by:
Roza
Based on "mkxp" by Ancurio et al

Spoiler: How to solve

To complete the puzzle, look at the numbers in the rows and columns. These tell you how many tiles should be filled in. Some tiles have already been filled for you, or crossed off. Crosses are where tiles do not go. If a column says "4+1" then four tiles are filled in in a row, then one extra with at least one space between them. Like in sudoku and crosswords (and other similar puzzles), you want to use logic and the other rows and columns to figure out where to fill in the tiles.

Hint: Column 1 is already complete, as it says 1 tile and it's been filled in for you.

To celebrate, reply below with what picross puzzles you will be releasing on the new Relic Castle forums.

Rumor has it you can receive a badge of completion if you also manage to complete the puzzle and DM it to me (on-site or on Discord is fine). Please don't spoil the surprise and post your completed puzzle in the replies!

Thank you for your time, I am excited for the new ERA of RELIC CASTLE!

 

[CelestialFearow]

Is this an elaborate among us joke? Cause it fell like it ngl

 

[SkyArmyRecru1t]

Alright, then I release this for the fellow puzzle enjoyers! Rumor has it that completing this puzzle gets you nothing, but your knowledge stat might increase a bit if you're successful.

 

[TechSkylander1518]

I'm excited to see all the new resources this genre will open up! I've already put together a dark mode script!

 

[Thundaga]

This was pretty tough, but I believe I've got the solution! Thank you for putting this event together, I'm excited for Picross to take over Fangames (as we all knew they should)!

I even made a Picross puzzle of my own, check it out!

Spoiler: My Picross Puzzle

Spoiler: Puzzle Solution

The puzzle isn't formatted properly, I just wanted an excuse to send a poggers over haha

 

[King_Waluigi]

OH THANK GOODNESSSSSSSS
I was so sick of playing fangame after fangame with the same boring thing:...
POKEMON! It's so boring to see.. oh look a pokemon game with gen 1-9, megas, zmoves, dmax, tera, +200 new fakemon and new custom megas

I see a bright future for relic castle, maybe even branching off past picross for sudoku??
(that's me teasing a sudoku plugin for picross btw..)

For right now, here's my picross fangame, you won't be disappointed!

(hint: I lost the solution, but the puzzle was kinda sus I think..)

 

[Voltseon]

Good luck, I bet nobody can beat it

Spoiler: Solution

 

[SkyArmyRecru1t]

Good luck, I bet nobody can beat it

Spoiler: Solution

There's absolutely no reason to make these so hard when we just started introducing these games. I spent 7 hours working this out and gave up because it was too ridiculously hard. Maybe spend more time on balancing and making fair puzzles, please and thank you.

 

[PurpleZaffre]

Pretty big one here, even picross can't escape my passion

Spoiler: Picross Puzzle

Spoiler: Solution

Of course, knowing me, it had to be overworlds :P

 

[catwithnojob]

SO many great additions already! Can't wait to see them on the new Relic Castle forums. Even if you haven't made an actual puzzle, drop your ideas! My next one is going to be a dating sim picross for sure!

 

[Tomix9tomix]

Someone should make a picross where your choices determine the ending picture you get. E.g each row and collumn has mutliple sets of numbers with an associated choice. "Kill your father: 1 2 2 1" and "Forgive your father: 3 5 2". And so depending on how you choose to play the picross, you get a different ending. Please make sure to include lots of blood and gore like a good fangame

 

[catwithnojob]

So sorry to everyone who submitted a Picross puzzle, gave us their ideas, and/or completed the Picross puzzle, but I've decided Relic Castle will be sticking to Pokémon fangames for now... Happy (belated) April Fools' Day!