Solitaire TriPeaks Flowers

Genre: Card Game (Solitaire – Misc.) / Puzzle

Players: 1

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Review:

Solitaire TriPeaks Flowers is a family-friendly game that… well, let’s just say it… isn’t TriPeaks. Rather, this is a Card Game with Puzzle elements that’s based on the rules for TriPeaks, but uses those rules to set up a series of pre-created puzzles for users to try to complete. This game was originally released on mobile devices in 2019, ported to Nintendo Switch in 2020, and brought to Xbox One and PlayStation 4 in 2021.

The moment you start this game, the game’s mobile origins make themselves absolutely clear – everything about the presentation here screams mobile port. If that doesn’t bother you, I can say the game uses clear, colorful visuals, and a nice, light, acoustic soundtrack. Unfortunately, players wanting variety in the presentation won’t find it here – you have no presentation options whatsoever.

The controls here are decent but not great with gamepad controls feeling a bit stiff. The optional touchscreen controls are clearly the way to go, as they work perfectly fine, and are clearly the way this game was meant to be played.

For the gameplay, each puzzle has cards arranged on the table differently, with some face up cards atop of other face-down cards, and much as in TriPeaks, players must clear cards on top before revealing what’s underneath. They do so by selecting cards that are sequentially one above or below the top card of their deck, moving in turn to try to create chains that run for as long as possible.

While it’s frustrating that there’s no version of the original TriPeaks here to play, setting this variant up as a level-based Puzzle game works fairly well, for the most part, giving players a decent feeling of progression. Unfortunately, this is hobbled somewhat by the game’s mobile roots. Players can always only select either previously-completed levels or the next level in the sequence, meaning that if you get stuck, you’ll stay stuck. Players can make use of “wild cards” they earn by completing objectives in the game, but this element is clearly a vestige of microtransactions that were in the original version of the game. The undo button here is also tied to an in-game currency that was clearly also a money-maker in the original release.

In the end, as long as you can get past the fact that this game doesn’t include a traditional, randomized TriPeaks game, Solitaire TriPeaks Flowers is a decent little time waster, and the $6 price tag may seem a bit much, but the $2 sale price is a bit more tolerable. However, the lack of options and the remnants of what was clearly previously a microtransaction-driven experience hurt this game. This is still a game that’s reasonably enjoyable, but with the aforementioned caveats.

tl;dr – Solitaire TriPeaks Flowers is a Card Game with Puzzle elements that’s best described as “inspired” by TriPeaks, with each of the game’s stages acting as a pre-crafted puzzle to solve. For what it is, it’s not bad, but the lack of features and ugly remnants of this game’s mobile roots mar the experience somewhat.

Grade: C-

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