Faerie Solitaire

Sorry about the long layover between posts, after going out of town with my in-laws, work suddenly decided to get quite hectic. But fret not, I have not given up on my dream of finishing my backlog, which is growing daily because of the winter sale. So here my friends, is the game I was playing:

Faerie Solitaire - $4.99
Time Played Before: 1 Hour
Time Played After Completion: 9 Hours

Review

I went into this game quite skeptical. I mean, I enjoy solitaire as much as the next person, but only the occasional hand when I'm really bored or just have nothing better to do. After playing through it though, I'm glad to say I was wrong to be that way. FS mixes the correct amount of difficulty, learning curve, collectables, and length. It puts all those together and creates a solitaire game I'll be playing for the foreseeable future.

So let's start with the basics, the actual game of solitaire. This isn't the typical game, alternating red and black and stacking from aces to king. I'm sure it's based off a type of solitaire, I just don't remember what one, now that I'm thinking more about it, it might be the one called golf, not that it really matters. Basically a bunch of cards are lain on the table face up and down randomly in stacks. You're given a deck to use with a single card face up. Let's say it's a 9. Looking at the table, if there is a 10 or an 8 on top of the decks, you pull it onto the 9. Then you continue going this way, with Aces going to 2's and K's, giving you the full circle. If you have nowhere to go, you draw a new card from your deck. Your goal is to get all the cards off the table before your deck runs out.

It sounds simple enough, and in theory it is. But there are obstacles in your way. Thorns block complete rows on the table until you complete a separate row with a rose on top. Some rows are frozen in ice until you reach a certain fire card. These elements add a bit more difficulty to the mix.

Each stage has nine hands of solitaire to be played. Making the trek through faerie world even more difficult, each stage has objectives to complete. In the beginning they're simple, such as get 1 perfect in the nine hands or get a combo (basically cards in a row) of 5 or 6. Near the end levels through these combine to create truly nightmare stages. 15 in a row, 4 perfects and completing the progress bar in 2 minutes all in one stage can be difficult. If the objectives aren't met after 9 hands, you start over on the stage.

Also, a number of challenge stages await you if you finish the adventure. They just add a different backdrop and harder objectives, but they are still something different. 

Each card played gives you cash to work with. Cash buys you power ups, some more useful than others. They are mostly passive, with a few adding more undo's or giving you the ability to grab a card from the table for the top of your deck after a succession of useless draws. By the time I completed the game, I had bought all the power ups, making the cash essentially useless in any other times I play through since they are linked to my profile.

Also, finishing rows gives you a random chance at items or eggs. These eggs hatch creatures that you then make "active" and they grow. Once the bar is complete, you use the items found to evolve them. They're essentially useless, but the collector in me wants to get them all and evolve them all for the achievements. Apparently it's quite the challenge though. Reading the forums have people playing for almost 100 hours and still missing eggs, playing thousands of hands. Good thing the game is actually good.

The story is relatively boring, it's relayed between each stage. I never payed much attention to it really, I was more about waiting for my objectives in the next stage. Some may enjoy it though, and it setup for the second game, which is currently in production.

Graphics are what you expect, it is a solitaire game after all. My only problem is, there is no resolution setting, so on my 1920x1080 27" monitor, it was quite ugly, but who cares what it looks like when the game is that much fun.

Final Verdict

Gameplay: 8/10
Graphics: 4/10
Sound: 6/10
Story: 6/10
Replay: 9/10

Overall: 7/10

If it weren't for the resolution problems and boring story, it probably would have hit an 8, but the fact of the matter is, it's just a good game. I won't be firing up windows solitaire anymore, that's for sure. Many people have the game siting in their library too, since the dev, Subsoap, seems to constantly just give the game away to everybody. Steamgifts.com had a giveaway of 10,000 copies a couple months ago, basically ensuring anybody who entered received one. Also, I got my copy from a Reddit board (or whatever you call it) I was directed to. Just a list of keys the dev put up. If you don't have it, support great devs like Subsoap. If you do, give it a run and get ready for Faerie Solitaire 2.

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Spinning for the next game....
Overlord..
I've actually tried to play it before, but it would just constantly crash. But, I shall give it a try again, since I'm running with a Nvidia card as opposed to a AMD now, maybe it'll work. Who knows. I will try to find a solution and play it. If I can't, there may very well be a new post tomorrow with a new roll.

Happy New Year everybody