Playing Classic Patience in Games by Zaweba

Classic Patience is the seven-column game that most people picture when they hear the word patience. In Games by Zaweba it sits on the Cards shelf, plays with a single pack and is for one player. The goal is to build each of the four suits up from ace to king.

If you have ever played patience on a computer, you will feel at home within a few moves. If you have not, it is one of the best games in the collection to start with, since the rules are few and the play is calm.

The layout and the rules

The cards are dealt into seven columns. Your job is to move cards around the columns until you can send every card to the four piles at the top right, where each suit is built up from the ace.

On the columns, cards go in descending order and must alternate red and black. A red six can go on a black seven, and a black five on that red six, and so on. Only kings may go into an empty column, so a cleared space is a chance to move a king and whatever sits on it.

When you run out of useful moves on the table, click the deck to turn cards. The cards you turn give you new options for the columns or the piles.

Moving cards

You have two ways to move a card. You can drag it to where you want it, or you can simply click it and the game sends it where it fits best. Clicking is quick and works well most of the time. Dragging is better when a card could go to more than one place and you want to choose.

Z undoes your last move. That is a gift in a game like this, where one careless move can block a column for the rest of the deal. Use it freely while you learn.

Playing well

A few habits make a big difference. Try to uncover the face-down cards in the columns as early as you can, since they are the cards you cannot otherwise reach. When you have a choice of moves, the one that turns over a hidden card is often the better one.

Be thoughtful about empty columns. Because only a king can go there, an empty column is valuable, but only if you have a king ready to fill it. Clearing a column with no king to move can leave you with a space you cannot use.

Do not rush cards to the piles at the top right. It feels like progress, but a low card sitting on a column can be just the place to rest a card of the other colour. Sending it up too early can leave you stuck.

Where it fits in the collection

Classic Patience is the gentle heart of the Cards shelf in Games by Zaweba. It suits a coffee break or the end of a long day, and it asks for attention without asking for speed. When you want more of a challenge, the shelf has other patience games with different rules, such as Open Cells, where every card is face up from the start, and Spinner Patience, played with two packs.

The game opens on a title card with the rules and controls, and F1 brings them back whenever you need them. Esc pauses the game if the kettle boils. Your plays, wins and best score are kept on the game's tile in the library, so you can watch your record grow over the weeks.