Microsoft Solitaire Collection Reviews

by Terryatrae

30 med to expert games today and the “top” 100 players starting with the top player was a total of 13 minutes!! I’m guessing they must be pastebook “fact checkers” in training. And the game ads, the junk freezes the graphics while the clock runs and they expect you to want to buy flawed programs? Or, they have some dork “playing” the demo puzzles to try to get you to download the junk because they expect you to figure you could do better than the idiot they used? So you almost get a good run and are getting a high level and the system freezes or loses cos you out with the clock continuing to run. Or you get placed on a “group” where you are competing against a gamer that has created a program that completes all the games by the gamer pushing one button. Must be a sad life resorting to a program to play your games for you. Probably the same people who build scams.

by Hannahbrian

I rarely review apps and up until the latest version released near the end of September 2018 I would have rated this 5 stars.
But the latest version introduced ads in the middle of gameplay. I thought to myself “I play this game a lot, I’d be willing to pay $5 to get rid of ads.” I clicked the “premium” button in game and saw it was $10. Ouch - that’s a lot to pay for a solitaire game - but I do play it a lot so maybe it is worth it? But then I saw it was $10 ANNUALLY!!!!!! You want me to pay and keep paying EVERY YEAR for a game of solitaire? With all due respect: what are you smoking? Actually do not tell me what you are smoking because getting me to smoke the same stuff is the only way you will ever get me to pay for a subscription for a game of solitaire.

You took a great thing and ruined it with greed. I hope for the sake of the players that your greed ruins this game and you fade into an occasional memory. I’m sure there are other solitaire games out there - time to start looking for one that is not greedy. Even if they charge a one-time fee I’ll gladly pay it over your greedy subscription.

by About To Abandon Microsoft

Too bad. I love the games, which should be a sure bet for MicrosoftSolitaireCollection getting 5 stars. But the ads ruin it. I was almost fine with the ads before. I understand it’s part of the deal for a free version. But constantly (or so it seemed) rerunning the same LONG ad for a crappie game you’d never buy & can’t skip after a few seconds brought me close to the edge. Then they started giving you the option to skip ads you weren’t interested in and that pulled me back. But now, with their latest ads, they’ve pushed me over the edge. Now ads play UNMUTED as a default. How obnoxious to have an ad start blaring out for everyone around you to hear. Couple that with making the mute button on the screen hard to see/find and you get the point that they have no respect for users. ADVERTISERS! Please note you are making more people PO’d than you could possibly be winning over. You should boycott this, too. Microsoft, you can really do better.

by Fluffybunniesx

I love solitaire, and I’ve played this game on different platforms. I recently started playing it again and doing the events, but sometimes the connection to the server drops and I’m forced to cancel sending my completed challenge, and start over. The time that I’ve already logged on that challenge somehow gets saved but not my completion status? And to top it off even if you cancel sending the score, it counts all the time in between when you cancelled to when you try and complete it again. My latest challenge marked me down as taking 9 hours to complete when even MicrosoftSolitaireCollection hasn’t been open that long. I find the challenges to be some of the more interesting features MicrosoftSolitaireCollection has to offer so I’m disappointed that some of these flaws are here. Should be simple enough to locally store a variable that says the challenge was completed so that when there is server connectivity, the game can send the score.

by Alterbentzion

I play this game on a device that’s usually offline. I don’t have a Microsoft account because (a) I care about privacy and (b) I’m usually offline, anyway. Just about every other day, the game insists on redownloading themes, etc., or claims that there’s new stuff to download. If I take a pass, either my existing themes disappear until I get online again, or the game tries to download material anyway, and generates an error message when it can’t reach the Microsoft servers. Also, thedata doesn’t get backed up to my laptop when I back up the rest of my data - so when I replace my devices, my achievements all disappear. This has been going on for months, if not years. If these are bugs, then they need to be fixed already. If it’s just Microsoft trying to ping me, then please stop already! It makes an otherwise fun game very frustrating.

by Janunson

This is the best gameplay, most attractive and satisfying graphics and interaction of any solitaire game out there by far. That’s why I keep playing it. I just wish the Microsoft underneath didn’t cause so much suckage.

The game is obsessed with your internet connection, even though it really shouldn’t need it to play a card game!! It takes forever uploading and downloading... nothing, before you can play it, and after each game, and if your connection has changed, like from WiFi to cell, or to a different WiFi, it doesn’t cache the data and try on the new connection - no, it freaks out and won’t save your score and won’t let you continue playing. It also downloads some unnamed “new content’ constantly, then forgets it the next time you open MicrosoftSolitaireCollection , and downloads it again! And the themes- apparently what it’s supposed to have downloaded (you get to dismiss two messages every time it tries!!) are still screwed up every time you play, and when you fix them (which usually only lasts 1 session) it wants to download then yet again!

Wow. So after writing all this down it’s clear I need to play a less visually slick solitaire game that isn’t so annoying. Again, the gameplay is the best, but the annoying bugs ruin it.

by JoeinAK

Love playing solitaire only problem I have is with the timed games. I can’t tell you how many times that the service can’t connect after I finish a game. It’ll take an extra minute or two and this extra time becomes part of your total time. Example you finish a game in say 2 minutes and it takes 2 minutes to finally connect so your total time is 4 minutes so this is totally not fair. Apparently Microsoft’s developers haven’t figured out how to eliminated this extra time due to there servers being overwhelmed by users. Sometimes after waiting for more than 5 minutes I quit out of the game and become frustrated so then give up playing for a while and go about my day. I then return later in the day and when I finish the game I had quit out of discover that even though I haven’t been using MicrosoftSolitaireCollection my total time ends up being the 2 or 3 hours I was doing other things. I even had it be over 8 hours for a game. I’m using an IPad an obvious competitor to the Microsoft surface tablet, funny bet those connect all the time. Otherwise I give them a 5 star review. I’m imagining that their developers will never read this but oh well.

by Amanda Jo 1984

Never fails, almost every other day (some times several days in a row), I finish a challenge in the daily event and I don’t know if it’s because of the ads constantly trying to load and/or refresh or if there’s a server issue, but the connection somehow gets lost. I sit and wait while the thing twirls but nothing happens even though I am on wifi and have full bars. So, I wait, then get annoyed, close out app and come back. Then I have to repeat level again. Okay, fine.. whatever. But to make matters worse, when I finally complete it the second time, I am given a grand total time of the first round plus the second and the timeframe it sat there twirling all because of your software issues... messes up my time on the daily event and it’s frustrating! I want to get a good time to hopefully be in the top 10 but it is a rarity since your app isn’t functioning properly. Please fix this! I am not sure if it’s the ads messing it up or what but if so, I shouldn’t have to pay for no ads to get your app to work as it should. Smh...

by Gruff'n'Stuff

The game itself is great; I enjoy all five variations of solitaire it offers and for the most part they are well done as far as their gameplay mechanics.

And I love playing the events-- but therein lies my problems.

When you finish a hand, sometimes the game won't proceed as it should; it shows a spinning icon because it's apparently having trouble connecting to the service, yet my Wi-Fi connection is up and the signal is strong. If you select cancel so you can proceed to the next hand in the event, you don't get credit for the hand you just completed and must repeat it.

Or, if you start a hand but then cancel out of it before finishing it because you have to go do something else, then come back later and start the hand all over again, the game doesn't merely add your previous time plus your new time, it actually counts all of the time from when you first began the hand to when you finished, even if you weren't playing the hand during most of that time and actually had MicrosoftSolitaireCollection closed down. As a result, the game might say that it took you, say, 8 hours or more to complete that hand, such as if you didn't go back into the game until after a night's sleep.

That hurts your standing in the event's leaderboard, which pretty much kills your enthusiasm for participating in the events. When something like that happens to me, it rubs me the wrong way so much that I basically avoid playing the game for days or weeks.

by Arblgrv

The games are fine, the graphics are good, the art is decent, there’s a good breadth of art. The problem is that I like to play competitions and too often I’ll be in the middle of playing and the game will dump me out or freeze. Case in point the anniversary games. I got not quite a third of the way through the whole thing, finished a klondike game and the screen froze as I was waiting for my score to be counted and the next game to show up.

This has happened too damned many times, and it’s super frustrating, especially when I’m doing well and bam! I’m locked out. My choices are wait and wait to see if somehow the glitch fixes itself (almost never happens), close the game, reopen it and then have to replay the game I just finished, or just give up. Lately I’ve been choosing just give up on it completely. What’s the point? By the time I get back in and replay my last game it doesn’t matter how well I’ve been doing, the time lost gives me an insurmountable handicap. It’s especially painful when it’s a very long match with a lot of points like the anniversary game play was. I am beginning to think there’s no reason for me to keep my premium membership on the site when I get shafted by it so often. It’s too bad because this is the game I play the most. I really enjoy it—when it works.

by Annavon

I wish there was a way to track the play time correctly. Sometimes during a tournament, I have to stop playing. When I return and replay the game, it counts the time that I was out of MicrosoftSolitaireCollection against my total time. For example, I played a game for 2 minutes, but I get a phone call and EXIT the game and MicrosoftSolitaireCollection completely, I come back 2 hours later and replay the game finish in 2 minutes and 40 seconds. My total time should be 4:40, but it shows as 2:04:40. Today, I was playing during my lunch break. I went back to work and went home and took a nap. I finished the last game of the tournament in around 4 minutes. My total time should have been around 35 minutes. However, it showed more than 7 hours!!! It should only show the time actually playing, not time when we are not in the game at all.

One more thing, it would be nice if there was a “pause “ button, so if you are interrupted, you can pause the game.

by 3WAgirl

I play this game almost every day. I love it, I love the daily challenges, and I love Spider most of all. Some things I would change: 1) When an impasse is reached in Spider, there’s no way to restart the game. In fact, there’s no way to restart any game in regular play. You can only start a new deck. What’s even weirder is that the warning sign says “quitting or restarting this game will count in your statistics” when you do it, so I feel like I’m missing a key option. 2) I have no option of playing a solvable deck if I choose Pyramid in regular mode. It’s always random, and that’s an option I’d like to change if I feel like it, just like all the other Solitaire games. 3) This is picky, but I liked the previous version of the “select game” window when beginning a new deck in regular play. The list is more straightforward, but somehow less classy-looking to me.

by Jayline87

I’ve tried multiple solitaire apps and this one is the best. I love the 5 different types of solitaire so that you have some variety. My favorite part of MicrosoftSolitaireCollection is the daily challenges they have (5 per day) and there are other challenges like the daily events. There’s a good range in difficulty so you can be challenged (expert/master) or just play for fun (easy). They’ve definitely figured out how to get people hooked on their app with all their challenges, badges and awards!

My only problem with MicrosoftSolitaireCollection is that there is often a glitch in the daily events. You are timed on how long it takes you to complete all events and ranked based on your time. However sometimes the game times out and you have to do the puzzle over and sometimes it will count time you are not playing (for example, I did half the challenges, came back and it added the 5 1/2 hours break to my time). It’s not the biggest deal but if you’re being ranked based on your time it would be nice if the time was accurate. It would also be nice to be able to pause while you’re playing.

by Ralexie2

I love this application with the exception that when finishing a challenge, if you are disconnected from internet, the only way you can get back to the game is by closing the application and starting the challenge once again. You will be in a loop hole if playing the same game you finished but the sad story is that the challenge is timed and the clock does not stop till you finally get your score and can move on to the next challenge. Even after you close the application, the clock continues. Developers should develop a memory bank where the application can acknowledge it disconnected, save your progress and stop the clock. This is critical because every challenge is timed! It is weird that you never find out when it disconnects till you finish the challenge and are waiting for the score to appear so you can move on.
Other than this, this application is the best I have ever played.
Wish someone could look into making a patch to fix this. I don’t know if it just happens to me because I am using an iPad or it happens to any one on any other platform.

by LesleyOdyssey

I love the game since first playing it on my pc years ago. I also participate in the tournaments. However, my main gross with this game is that whenever an ad comes up “before” I start a tournament game, it counts towards the time I actually do spend while playing. Last night I put the phone down during an ad and got up watching tv. 3 hours later, I take the phone up to close the ad and start the game. Lo and behold, when I finished playing the “easy” game in less than 2 minutes, I see the total time for a little over 3 hours!!!!! And God forbid I should have some internet issues “after” I’ve completed a game because the clock is still ticking away until the connection returns!!!! This is extremely frustrating and a huge turn off to play the tournaments anymore until last night but now I’m back to sticking to the daily challenges only unless this “glitch” is fixed.

by Baddison92

*** My suggestion — I would like to see an undo/restart feature on FreeCell, Klondike, and Spider. The TriPeaks and Pyramid games already have a similar “undo all” feature that is really helpful. I would like to see a similar restart/undo all therwise I find myself having to click undo dozens of times when I get stuck during a game. Also maybe an option where it shows/teaches you how you could have solved the game so you can learn. And an option for hints during the events/daily challenges.***

Love MicrosoftSolitaireCollection! Great that there are 5 games in one, and the daily challenges and daily event games are really fun and encourage me to play all 5. Could be improved with an “undo all” feature on all games.

by Lagrima De Cristal

I am fascinated by this game, some challenges are really complicated, and I love that they make you think, the only but, is that although you have an excellent internet in your house, sometimes a half game Solitaire server, suffers from some interruption, this You can see it when after a game, it does not save that it is finished, and if you do not close it or practically disconnect, add all that disconnection time to the registry of your game, so if you finished a new one in 30 seconds, and you leave it like this Waiting for it to reconnect, it will appear that you were there all that time, that it can be 3, 5 or 12 hours, or until you resume it, and add it to your registration, that's why you lose positions. And if you lose, just look at who, since there are players who have more than one account, the idea is to know the games and do them quickly, the second or next time, only then can they win. But if you won the first try, feel happy.

by Felicity Porter

This is one of my favorite games that I never miss playing. There’s so much variety and the game is very well done. I have been a premium subscriber for years and it’s well worth the money. The game has lots of features and the daily tournaments are great. The only issue I have with the game is that the tournaments don’t seem to allow you to pause your overall time, which is what prompted me to write this review. The other day I was in the middle of a tournament game when an important phone call came in. I switched my phone from the game to the call and the time kept running like I was actively playing. Yeah, a total first-world problem, but an issue nonetheless. Still it’s a favorite and part of my morning routine every day.

by MiniNiNi45

Well I guess you didn’t like my review because while I was writing it it disappeared sounds very much like Microsoft. It’s pretty much why I went to Apple with everything but I chose to download some of your games because they seem to be helpful for my mind since my stroke.
Although, I paid for the ads to be gone for one of the games you would think that you would just do that across-the-board for those two or three different games.
I’ve got the solitaire and the word game but you would think that you would just do that across-the-board ——because that’s just crappy ——you want somebody to pay something to remove ads for each individual one—— it’s either gonna be 10 bucks for a year or two bucks a month FOR EACH GAME and that’s just seriously WRONG.
Y’ALL just wanna make a buck every way you can but I’m definitely canceling the other one and I’ll just live with the ads or quit playing.

by Brian481516

I play Klondike solitaire frequently, over 2,200 times. I play it different the most people. I like to use easy settings and just try to beat my time. My best time is 1:06. 3 things I’d really like to see in a future version: 1) I really wish the bar at the bottom at least had an option to always stay visible. A lot of times I’m reaching for a button on the bottom and accidentally close it. That can be annoying when I’m trying to play as fast as I can. 2) it would be a really interesting feature if you could re-play a deck at then end of the game... or even save a deck so it can be played again at a later date (possibly multiple times). 3) it would be fun to be able to see more stats, average game time, etc. ideally it would be awesome to see a graph with game time on the y axis and date played on the x axis (plots points would be red or green for win or loss). Then I could see how I’m doing over time.

by Xantharius

This is everything you love about solitaire. The card action and sounds are great; the graphics look good; it’s a good solitaire experience.

But—

If I have just one stack of cards that’s unturned (everything is else is Kings or is turned) MicrosoftSolitaireCollection should just complete the rest for me—do I have to go through the motions of making every single card in the deck move into its correct place before “Solve” appears? I know I’m done! Just finish it for me!

And when there are no remaining moves possible, MicrosoftSolitaireCollection should know that, and not make me ask for hint after hint just to verify that fact. I know that I can’t make any more moves—why would MicrosoftSolitaireCollection not just work that out and tell me right away? This point is definitely the one that needs the most attention, as it’s a pain to have to not just cycle through every card in the remaining deck, but also have to request a hint on each occasion to provoke MicrosoftSolitaireCollection to report that no further moves are possible.

I appreciate the work that goes into app-making. Sorting out these two points would improve things considerably. Thanks for the work you’ve put into MicrosoftSolitaireCollection .