Nintendo just announced a brand new iOS and Android mobile application called Pictonico that turns your everyday pictures into short and chaotic mini games. The game scans the camera roll on your iPhone or takes new pictures on the spot to grab the faces of your friends and family. It then drops those familiar faces into wild scenarios like skydiving, running from zombies, or dancing as a ballerina.
The new app requires volume purchases to unlock all eighty levels
The app is built by Nintendo and Intelligent Systems. It shares the same rapid-fire energy as the popular WarioWare series. You only have a few seconds to figure out what to do and tap or swipe the screen to win. Since it relies on your own pictures rather than standard art, every round feels a bit different. You can even save the funniest results as videos or pictures to share with other people.
While the app is free to download on the App Store, that only gets you a basic demo. If you want to play all eighty mini games, you need to buy extra game volumes inside the app. Nintendo confirmed that the software processes all the face cropping right on your device. It never sends your personal images to any outside servers.
You only need an active internet connection when you first open the game or when you buy new levels. After that, you can play completely offline. Pre-registration is open right now, and the full release arrives on May 28. It is a very clever way for Apple and Android users to get more fun out of the hundreds of pictures just sitting in their digital albums.
