Solitaire and Puzzles Are Neatly Married in Puzzlecards

I admit it, I’m not the most social gamer. When the opportunity arises, I’m willing to sing with my personal group of friends while they jam on the instruments of Rock Band, or let them all completely destroy me at Mario Kart. But most of my gaming hours are spent alone or, at most, with my husband watching me explore the mountains of Skyrim. I like puzzles, and as you might guess, I like solitaire. So the idea of combining the two is appealing.

Puzzlecards is not quite solitaire and not quite a puzzle game, but instead is both at the same time. The cards are similar to those of a standard deck, and are presented on a 4×4 grid. The player swipes with a finger to merge two matching cards together, and those two cards then combine into a single new card of the next highest number in sequence. For instance, merging two aces creates a two, while merging two nines creates a ten. So on and so forth. The goal of the game is simple, in theory: Merge enough cards to create two kings side by side, then merge those to create a 13. Creating the 13 wins the game.

Created by one-man Norwegian developer Soriko, Puzzlecards offers a number of entertaining features, such as night mode. It boasts an enjoyable soundtrack, a leaderboard in the Apple Game Center, and a clever user interface with smart gestures and navigation.

Puzzlecards will launch exclusively for iOS devices on May 5, 2015. The basic app will be free of charge in the Apple App Store; optionally, purchasing the full version for $1.99 USD will remove all ads from the game. To see what else Soriko has on the horizon, be sure to follow the studio on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, or Instagram.