PicoChat is a new instant messaging app for iPhone that captures the nostalgic essence of Nintendo DS's PictoChat. Designed by Idrees Hassan, it incorporates familiar features such as stylus and drawing tools, reminiscent of the original app launched in 2004. Although PictoChat was limited by connectivity requirements on handheld consoles, PicoChat adapts this experience within iMessage, aiming to provide users with a pleasant and less overwhelming platform for casual communication. While it can't entirely recreate the unique feeling of the DS app, it serves as a nostalgic reminder for fans.
The Nintendo DS' stylus-based messaging app PictoChat wasn't the first place I instant-messaged (that would be my friend's AIM account) but it was absolutely the least overwhelming and most pleasant place it happened.
PicoChat looks like a version of PictoChat that's been squeezed into the lower-third of your iPhone, complete with alphanumeric and emoji keyboards, and controls to change the line weight of your drawings.
Still, Nintendo included the software on the DS Lite and the DSi in 2006 and 2009, respectively, and the 3DS' optional Swapnote app was considered a spiritual successor of sorts when it came out in 2011.
PicoChat can't fully recreate the small, personal feeling of PictoChat while strapped on top of iMessage, but if you miss the cumbersome, but considered messaging of your DS days, it's a pretty great hit of nostalgia.
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