I never knew how much I wanted a new Solitaire game to play until I was trapped at my parent's house with only an (actually really good) Windows tablet PC to use. I honestly really enjoyed Shadowhand, and the desire to match cards hit me again. So I looked for some games and settled on Snow White Solitaire: Charmed Kingdom, a game I forgot I owned. Solitaire is fun! So I went ahead and gave this one a real shot to see if it scratches that same itch.
If you're wondering, there is actually a story to Snow White Solitaire, but there's not much to say about it. In one quick paragraph, Snow White awkwardly introduces herself, declares her kingdom under attack, announces that she needs to find five magic beans, and goes off on a quest to fight her godmother. Or something like that. Every now and again a new character pops up and goes "yeah I hate your godmother too, here's where the next bean is." I guess that's a story? It's a thing.
Snow White Solitaire is not normal Solitaire, but rather a variation known as Golf Solitaire. You draw a card, and you can remove cards from the board so long as they are one number above or below the card currently in your hand. You keep playing until either you run out of cards in your hand, or you've pulled all the cards from the board. That's a simple enough concept, and it makes the game extremely easy to pick up and play.
Of course, if that was all there was to it, then there's not much else to say. As you may expect, there's more. As you play, barriers block you from drawing cards. You’ll see locked cards, cards surrounded by thorns, frozen cards, and more. However, they’re all solved by the same action. You need to match cards to find an item to break the barrier and move forward. It's all simple enough, and shouldn't stop you from matching cards.
On her adventures, Snow White comes across a party of different characters looking to help her. In gameplay, they’re all represented by abilities, each with its own cooldown. For example, the knight can change the card in your hand to one you can use, while the wizard-type guy (hilariously referred to in-game as a "swamp goblin") lets you see cards that are flipped upside down. Using these abilities you can gather long chains of cards removed from the board, which in turn gets you more gold. You can use the gold to buy items, most of which just serve as upgrades for your companions. Getting my knight to give me two cards instead of one is a welcome boost.
Occasionally,Snow White has minigames that dip into a different casual genre. Usually, this involves jigsaw puzzles or a hidden object game. The jigsaws are hilariously easy to solve because the pieces will always lock into place if they're dropped vaguely close to where they should be. The hidden picture parts are fine, but there's little unique about them. If you're not into them, both minigames offer the ability to skip them at no penalty.
Snow White Solitaire: Charmed Kingdom sure is a solitaire game. That's fine, there's nothing wrong with that. When I have a Windows tablet, a nice touch screen efficient game makes for a really good companion. Same for when I'm on a train. Or when I'm flying to Texas. Wherever I go and need to match cards to pass the time. Now I know I can do it with a Snow White background.
TechRaptor played Snow White Solitaire: Charmed Kingdom on PC using a copy purchased by the player.
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