More Fun when Playing with Yourself
Yes, that’s right: Microsoft finally decided to redesign Solitaire for Windows since it’s first appearance in 1990. While downloading 539.1 MB worth of Updates I decided to write this short review. Now with pictures and hence even more pleasing to the naked eye. This is an updated version of the article I posted yesterday evening, but still I decided to keep its timestamp — the good ol’ times….
Look and Feel
Definitely Nintendo-inspired. The cards are popping up, shuffling and turning in a very playful manner, neat hints help you with your first patiences. If you don’t like the cute and round look you can change the decks with a single hit on F7. There you can select between various kinds and decks, from colorful Web-2.0-y to a serious classy look. Only the background is a little to grassy green for me, I prefer the old EGA dark green color-fill (#00AA00).
Did I mention that you can finally play in fullscreen mode on your 1920*1080-screen and still find the cards? Thanks to the vector-shapes they always have the same proportions.
Gameplay
One and most important new feature: When moving the visible cards from a hidden deck the first card turns around automatically: No more clicking is required but done automatically. This will definitely ease some of the game’s enjoyment.
Long employed office workers, students and bored housewives, Solitaire veterans with one word know: You don’t have to drag every card yourself to the upper stacks (once they’re there), you can use a double click. And here’s another subtle optimization to the original: You may now use a right click too. This will save you half of the mouse clicks better spent in FPS
When you try an illegal move a little pop-up on the lower left will inform you what can be done and what can’t. Further there is a hunk of sound effects, so you might want to turn up your volume or tun it off completely.
After the game
Now here’s the catch: Windows Vista presents you your statistics after each game: How long it took you, how many game’s you’ve won so far and what your lose/win-ratio is. Mine is terrible, because I spent more than 900 seconds of the game writing this review.
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