Bicycle Limited Edition CD-ROM

CARD GAMES FOR THE ENTHUSIAST

A Review of Bicycle Limited Edition CD-ROM

by Susan Davis

Bicycle Limited Edition CD-ROM contains an excellent group of card games

that the true card game enthusiast can appreciate.

It offers Solitaire,

Poker, Cribbage, and Bridge; each is run independently, but with the

advantage of a simple, but well-rendered, common interface. The DOS version

is run directly from the CD-ROM, and the Windows version does the same, with

the exception of loading the four game icons into a program group for you.

It is wonderful to finally play a game without dumping a horde of files onto

my hard drive.

Each game has the same intuitive menu interface, and you can quickly pick up

on how to change the various options and setting available to you. You use a

point-and-click or drag-and-drop interface, depending on the game. The help

system is wonderful; if you don’t know how to play a game, or can’t remember

the rules, the help system can teach you what you need to know. Before

playing Bicycle, I didn’t even know how to play Bridge, but it taught me the

rudiments well, and even suggested a good book to learn more.

The Solitaire game is fantastic. You can choose from 49 different games, and

the program even groups them into categories from Easy to Hard to Favorites,

so you can choose the type of game you want – easy to win or challenging and

tricky. With all four programs in the series, you can control your

background colors and sound. In some solitaire games, you can control

options to the games, if the rules allow. All you have to do is check the

Options section of the menu. The statistics are pretty complete, including

information on number of games played and how well you are doing overall.

You can even save games or game sessions in progress! About the only things

I would have added would be an Autoplay feature once you know you have won,

and some sort of notification once you had made a move that stalemates the

game. Other than that, I really enjoyed these versions of solitaire.

The Poker game was equally well done. Each player brings different skills

and habits to the table. The instructions are good for beginning poker

players, so even novices like me can enjoy the game. However, it seems to be

complex enough, with two poker game variations, to entertain even more

skilled players.

You can vary the wild cards, betting limits, and the

players. Like all of the other games, you can also save games and sessions

in progress, which is a feature I found really useful. You don’t have to

give up on that winning streak just because it’s late at night.

The Cribbage game is a good version; and, unlike many versions, it offers

two variations (duplicate cribbage and losing cribbage) for some variety.

The great thing about playing versus the computer is that it keeps count of

everything. When you are trying to learn to play, this can be a wonderful

teaching mechanism. It also offers hints, which are usually pretty good,

although experienced players might want to trust their hunches at times. The

computer is a savvy player, which gives skilled players a challenge, while

the hint system allows even beginners to have a chance to win.

Bridge turned out to be quite a bit more like Pinochle or Hearts than I had

thought. I had never played Bridge before, but the game has good

instructions, and it scores for you, as well as providing hints if

necessary. If you are familiar with the hand play in Pinochle or Hearts, the

basics of Bridge won’t be that hard to learn. For experienced Bridge

Players, it seems that you have access to the normal features of Contract

Bridge, but you don’t have to worry about the little details, like scoring,

because the computer tracks it all for you. I found that trying to figure

out the auction and scoring was difficult, but friends who know how to play

Bridge assured me that these are also some of the hardest things to learn

when playing Bridge with live opponents.

Each game was quite enjoyable to play. On slower machines, you can turn off

various animated effects to speed things up, but my 486DX2-66 played the

games very smoothly, and there was no noticeable lag time on any features.

In fact, the game-playing interface was extremely well done. I had no

problems at all with installation, running the programs, or learning how to

play. All I had to do was sit down, choose a game, and play. It wasn’t even

as hard as hunting around the house to find a deck of cards. I didn’t need

to find an opponent, and I didn’t have to shuffle or deal the cards! All in

all, in Bicycle Limited Edition, SWFTE has produced a real winner in both

playability and entertainment value.

Gamer’s Zone Scorecard

Product:	Bicycle Limited Edition CD-ROM
Company:	SWFTE International PO Box 219 Rockland, DE 19732-9904
Cost:	$19.98

System Requirements:

IBM AT/286/386/486, MS-DOS compatible,
MS-Windows 3.1 or later (for Windows version),
MS-DOS or PC-DOS version 3.1 or later,
CD-ROM Player,
EGA, VGA or higher resolution monitor,
Mouse optional, Hard Disk recommended

Breakdown:

Fun Factor 4
Graphics 4
Sound 4
Interface 4
Replayability 5

Overall Score: