One of the best things about freecell is that every game can be won but you can't begin to look at it too rigidly or you will get locked into patterns that might work for a while but will ultimately fail. It is this search for the solution that makes freecell better than so many other card games that come with microsoft windows.

Freecell is a very simple game. You have a deck of cards dealt out in front of you into 8 piles. Four are six cards deep the others seven. Unlike other solitaire games you can see every card. Once the cards are dealt you have all the information that you want. You can move any card only the card of the next value up in the opposite color. For example a red queen can go on the black king.

The key to this game is that you can't move entire stacks of cards without free cells. You begin with four free cells. Any card you want can go there but only one card. If you want to move a stack you have to be able to put each card into one of those cells, or into an empty stack on the board.

The object of the game is to stack all of the cards onto the aces. To do this you must first get the aces in their own piles then move cards of the same suit onto it starting from the two and working up to the king.

Each game of freecell begins with a new sorting of cards. If you are lucky one or even a couple of the aces may be free immediately. If so simply click on them and they will drop into their spot. Don't worry too much about moving cards onto those aces. The game does this automatically when there are no cards lower that can go onto it. This means if you uncover an ace it will automatically go into its spot. If the ace is there the two will do the same. Once all the twos have been moved the threes will go automatically. The only time you will move them yourself is when you are trying to uncover another card.

The key to winning most games is to free all the aces, to open up free columns and to sort the cards. The game will give you hints but they typically fail because they are short sited. If you move a card onto the freecells you should know what you are going to do with the card underneath it.

In most cases by the time you have the aces free you have a free column. If you can get a king onto that empty space you should do so. Put everything you can onto a king that has nothing under it. If you can get a single row of cards from king to two in a column you are almost guaranteed a victory. Then simply sort cards working your way towards the next lowest card available on the board. Every card on an ace gives you more room and makes the game easier. Do your best not to fill up the free cells and never put high cards onto it if there is any other choice. Kings in freecells are next to impossible to get rid of.

In the end you'll often discover that the path you wanted didn't work. Don't give up though. Instead, use Control - Z and back up to the last major choice you made. There is nothing wrong with trying a new path. The real pleasure of freecell isn't being right the first time but figuring out the puzzle.

Learn more about this author, Elton Gahr.
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