Yes, I'm still bobbing around here somewhere, I'm just insanely busy with one thing and another. Fee...
Yes, I'm still bobbing around here somewhere, I'm just insanely busy with one thing and another. Feel free to visit my homepage (I'll update it soon - promise!)
Member since:23.07.2000
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Card games seem to be a favourite with computer users, and indeed, with the general population. You have only to look at the games included with Windows to see what I mean – Solitaire, Hearts and Freecell – the only non-card game is Minesweeper (although Hearts bows out of Win2000 in favour of pinball game 3D Pinball Space Cadet). They're clearly a favourite between programmers, and I suppose it's because they're simple to play once you've mastered the rules, and probably not all that hard to program either!
I only discovered Freecell recently. When I say 'discovered', I don't mean it in the conventional sense of the word – I always knew it was there, but I'd never really made a conscious effort to learn how to play it. It wasn't until I started this series of ops that I thought I'd give it a try! Well, a quick trawl through the help file and a few practice games saw me straight, and I'm sure my girlfriend will give me some tips when she comes round later!
- Get to the bloody point
Yeah yeah, ok! Freecell
works in some respects the same way as peoples champion Solitaire does, but it has enough differences to make it a game in it’s own right. Whether one was developed from the other I don’t know, but lets take a look how it works shall we?
Like Solitaire, you start of with some cards dealt out on the screen in front of you. However, unlike Solitaire, you start off with ALL the cards dealt out in front of you! This is where the big differences start – it adds a lot to the game, but I’ll come to that in a short while. The cards have been dealt out face up into 8 columns – 4 with 6 cards, 4 with 7 cards. Above the cards there are 8 ‘cells’ (little boxes at the top of the playing area). The left hand four are the eponymous free cells, and they give the game it’s freedom. The right hand four are the home cells, and this is where you want the cards to end up.
In the same way as Solitaire, the aim of the game is to transfer all the cards from the standard playing area to the home cells in order, and in suit – so each cell must contain one suit and one suit only, and they must be place in there ace first, then the 2, then the 3 – all the way up to the king.
The cards in the columns can be placed on top of one another in alternating suits and descending value (like Solitaire, remember?) If there are no cards in the column, you can place any card on the space. Ideally, you want to try and get four columns with all the cards in, except those you have already transferred to the home cells. This is not as easy as it sounds – moving the cards around is difficult without any free space, and getting to the cards underneath the topmost ones is even more difficult. That’s what the free cells are for – you can put any cards in them, but once they have one in, they are ‘full’ and you can’t place any more cards in there. The free cells are your lifeline, so it’s important to try and keep as many free as possible at all times.
You move the card by clicking on them and then clicking on their destination. Double clicking will move the card up to the home cell if it will fit in there, or to a free cell if the clicked card is not meant to go in the home cells yet. Right clicking on a card within one of the columns will reveal it so you know what cards you're dealing with. And you can move more than one card by clicking on the topmost card and clicking where you want it to go – the computer will ask you whether you want to move the column or the card. But more on that in a second.
- What else is important?
Any veteran Solitaire players will know that handy little move where you grab the bottom few cards and drag them across to another column to free up a card. Well, you can't strictly do THIS in Freecell, but there is a variant that you CAN do. Imagine you wanted to move an 8 and a 7, which are on top of each other, onto a 9. What you could do is move the 7 into a free cell, and then move the 8 onto the 9, then move the 7 back. In effect, you've moved two cards – and this is how you do the 'drag cards' maneouvre in Freecell. As long as you have enough free cells empty, you can simply click on the base card, then on where you want to put them, and the computer will move the cards for you, hence saving you from that rather lengthy process. Nice!
Another important thing to remember about Freecell is that it is always possibly to win. Unlike with Solitaire, where there are games that are just impossible to win, Freecell can always be won. It has yet to be categorically proven, but it is what we computer scientists call a thesis – it's almost certainly true, but it hasn't been proven yet. There you go – you learn something new every day :)
- It's your own choice
There's a few options in Freecell which you'll be able to work out for yourself – the main choice is the game itself. The cards aren't randomly dealt – the games themselves are numbered. I'm not sure whether this is some sort of 'seeded' approach, or whether all the games are just stored in the program, but the point is this – if you choose 'New Game', then the program randomly picks a game for you to play from 32000. However, if you make a note of the number in the title bar, and later choose 'Select Game', you can type in the number and play the same game again. So you can keep coming back to a specific game until you've mastered it. Alternatively, you can master one game and amaze your friends with your skill :)
- Anything else?
Well, the only other part of the game (apart from the king's head at the top that follows your mouse pointer!), is the statistics. This is chosen from the File menu, and allows you to track how your games have been going so far – winning (and more commonly losing!) streaks, number of games won and lost and so on. So you can cringe at your inadequacies of course :)
- Deal me one
So, how is Freecell? Well, compared to Solitaire it wins hands down – the variety and intricacies of the game mean it's a lot more fun to play, and has greatly enhanced lastability. The game isn't exactly easy, so it's certainly challenging, but as long as you have a little patience you should get along fairly well. Not exactly game of the year, but an interestingly little game nonetheless.
I agree with you totally the only thing I want to know is how the hell do you shake the addiction, had it for about 3 years and it is standing joke with hubby when we upgraded to XP refused to do it unless I got freecell with it
MALU 25.09.2002 21:47
You've explained the game very nicely, and I've just posted an op with some ideas on the game as such. Cheers, Malu
Boris 05.08.2001 19:01
Spot on sir! Freecell-the scourge of students' degrees!! Cheers - Matt
Advantages: Free, lots of skill and strategy required, statistics available Disadvantages: No 'undo' button in the Windows version, only one player, can be addictive!
Kukana 04.10.2003 ·
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Review of Freecell (PC)
Advantages: Free, lots of skill and strategy required, statistics available Disadvantages: No 'undo' button in the Windows version, only one player, can be addictive!
Kukana 04.10.2003 ·
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful
Review of Freecell (PC)
Jul 19th, 2001
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