I recently reviewed Chef Solitaire: USA from The Revills Games, and the team reached out to see if I wanted to give Legends of Solitaire: Curse of the Dragons a look as well. Watch the trailer:

Plot

“Long ago, the Solitaire Kingdom was cursed by an ancient, evil spell! To lift the curse once and for all and return the kingdom to its former glory, you must embark on a great quest and defeat the dragons! Gather companions, trade coins for goods at the blacksmith’s workshop, and claim rightful victory against these ferocious beasts!”

The plot is standard high fantasy, with dragons, the adventurers who slay them, and an ancient curse. There is a heavy Lord of the Rings vibe here (even down to the 4 card, who is a clear homage to Orlando Bloom’s Legolas). You’re probably not here for the plot, but I like that it’s there as a backdrop. Every chapter has a few narrated paragraphs that progress the story, and they’re presented like chapters in a book, which lends itself well to the fantasy/storybook theme.

Graphics and Sound

The backgrounds are really beautiful; I’ve been taking screenshots of quite a few of them. You get a new background for every chapter that reflects what’s happening in the story, like entering the woods or hanging out with dwarves. The overhead map that I included as a screenshot above is quite nice too. The music is beautiful, if not super varied, but I liked the tracks so much that I didn’t mind when they repeated. There’s a narrator, as in Chef Solitaire, and this time it’s a wizard; he sounds great.

Gameplay

The main draw of LoS: CotD is, of course, going to be the solitaire. There are three difficulties, and I’ve been playing on casual. This means that you have a high chance for special cards, more points per card, your weapons don’t break (more on that in a second), and you can go from King to Ace and vis versa. For a challenge, you can play on normal or hard, which will make things more difficult. The weapons I mentioned are cards you can find that will help you clear obstacles that block cards: vines, ice, and rocks. If you’re playing on normal or hard, you either have to keep finding those cards while you play or keep buying them in the store. The other obstacles are a lock (which needs a key that you can either find in the deck or buy in the store) and fire from dragons, which can only be put out with a potion you buy from the store. Weirdly, you can only have one of these in your inventory at a time, and they don’t carry between levels. You can buy a bunch of other stuff in the store to help out, but only need to buy that once.

At the beginning of your quest, you’ll choose a companion who can help you out once they’re charged up. Along the way, you’ll recruit three more companions. The wild cards in this game don’t work like the one in Chef Solitaire; you find them in the cards on hand, and they transform into a specific numbered card instead of being able to use it as a true wild card. There are random pickaxe cards in the deck that act as a true wild card, but it’s sometimes difficult to use them strategically. This system was a little frustrating. The biggest frustration, though, is how clearing the chapters works. Each chapter has a number of goals to reach by the end of its ten stages; things like earn X amount of gold, earn X amount of stars, get X amount of perfects, and so on. If you don’t achieve all these things by the end of the chapter, you have to replay the ENTIRE chapter; you’re not allowed to go back and play individual stages in order to get your counts up. This is the reason I haven’t finished the game yet – it’s a huge deterrent to have to play ten stages again in order to reach your goals. I’m glad that Chef Solitaire improved on this mechanic.

Final Thoughts

This is a beautiful solitaire game that I’m really enjoying, but some frustrating mechanics mean that this might not be my first recommendation for your solitaire needs.

Score: B

Get the game on Steam here for $8.99. Check out the website, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube.

[Disclaimer: A review code was provided for me to review this game.]