Anycolor

Observed in play

You choose a drawing from a list that covers animals, people, food, vehicles and abstract shapes, then choose a palette. Every tap fills one section with the selected colour.

The palettes are the design decision. Because the colours in a palette are chosen to sit together, a picture filled at random still looks deliberate, which is most of why the game is pleasant.

Undo and redo are there and worth using. Trying a colour, looking, and stepping back is faster than planning a picture before you start.

Finished pictures can be saved, and more palettes and pictures are added on Poki’s side over time. Nothing is scored and nothing expires.

The section outlines do the structural work. Because a drawing is already divided, you are never choosing where a colour stops, only which colour goes where, and that is a much smaller decision to make over and over.

It is worth knowing what the game does not do. There is no drawing, no brush size to manage and no blending. Anything you might want to change about a picture comes down to which palette you picked and which section you filled with what.

Palettes are grouped by mood rather than by subject, so the same drawing can be finished warm, cold or muted without you making a single colour decision yourself. A palette you would not normally pick is the fastest way to get something unexpected out of a picture you have already coloured once.

Saving is worth doing as you go. A finished picture can be downloaded, and since nothing counts your output, the saved file is the only record that a session happened at all.

Notes for a first attempt

• Choose the palette before the picture. It shapes the result far more than the drawing does.
• Start with the largest areas. The small sections read differently once the background is down.
• Use undo freely. Comparing two colours in place is quicker than deciding in advance.
• Leave a few sections in one flat colour. Filling everything differently is what makes a picture look noisy.
• Colour the same drawing twice with two different palettes. It is the clearest way to see what the palettes are doing for you.