Copyright: King's Corners Copyright 1993, FSA Inc.


King's Corners
A game of Solitaire

King's Corners

How to play the game

Menus

Sample Screens

Technical Information

Version 2.1

Copyright 1993

 Financial Systems Associates, Inc.

148 N. Washington St.

Delaware, Ohio  43015

Written by Stephen R. Woods


Menus

    Game

New Game......	Quits the current game and starts a new one.

Suits...............	Toggles suits on the Kings' squares on the next deal.  This option requires you to match the suits of any Kings that are dealt to the proper suit displayed on Kings' squares.  When this option is toggled on, the menu item changes to No Suits.

Undo..............	During Normal Play, clicking UNDO will remove the most recently played card  from the playing board and return it to the draw pile giving you a chance to play that card in a different space.  Note that you've already seen the next card to be played, so you gain a small advantage (almost cheating) when you use UNDO.

During Discard Mode, clicking UNDO will remove the first discard currently sitting on the left discard square or the last pair discarded.  If you have discarded a ten, UNDO will not work.

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Exit................	Ends the game and returns you to Microsoft Windows

   Sound

Sound on.......	Enables interesting sounds during the game such as the deck of cards being shuffled, cards being played, etc.  A sound card (such as the SoundBlaster) is required for this option to work.

Sound off.......	Disables interesting sounds during the game.  The standard Windows warning    beep will still be audible in situations requiring attention.

    Help

How to Play..	Invoke Windows Help for King's Corners.

About...........	Displays an ABOUT box which contains important information.


How to Play the Game

The object of the game is to place all face cards around the perimeter of the playing board.  The playing board consists of sixteen squares, four squares per row.  Kings, Queens, and Jacks must be placed in particular squares as shown below.  The suit of the face cards does not matter unless you are playing with the Suits option turned on.

To begin the game, click on the Draw Pile and the first card will be dealt face up immediately to the right of the draw pile.  Press and hold down the left mouse button and drag the newly dealt card to one of the sixteen squares on the playing board.  Drop the card on the desired square by releasing the mouse button.  (Note that you may also just click the left mouse button on an empty square if you prefer not to drag and drop the newly dealt card.  Either way works fine.)  Non face cards (aces through tens) may be placed on any square.  Jacks  through Kings must be placed as shown in the above grid.  The program will beep and remove any face cards dropped in the wrong place; you must then drag and drop the card on a correct square.  If you have the Suits options turned on, then the suit of each King must match the suit displayed in the grid square.  Note that when this option is on, the value of the suit in each corner square changes whenever a new game is started.

If the four middle spaces of the playing board are occupied, you must place cards in a space reserved for a face card (Jack, Queen, or King).  In this case, place the card in an empty space of the face card with the most open spaces.  For example if three Jacks, three Kings and one Queen are currently showing on the playing board and the middle four squares are used, place your card on an empty Queen space because if you block the empty Jack or King spaces and a Jack or King is dealt next, you lose the game immediately.  By using the empty Queen's space for your card, you still have two open spaces available for Queens as well as the open spaces for one more Jack and one more King.

If you accidentally put one of your cards in the wrong square, you can UNDO the most recent play by clicking on the GAME menu item and clicking UNDO.

After all sixteen squares have been filled, Discard Mode begins.  This is your chance to potentially regain free spaces from non-face cards.  Discards must be made in pairs with the sum of each pair totaling exactly ten (10).  The exception to this rule is the ten card itself; the ten of any suit must be discarded singly, and not as part of a pair.  Each card's face value is used in computing the sum of the pair.  Note that Aces count as one (1).  For best results, discard cards from the playing board's perimeter before discarding them from the middle spaces. You always want to leave open as many spaces as possible for Jacks, Queens, and Kings.

The Discard process is as follows.  Click on the first card of the pair to be discarded; this card will be removed from the playing board and appear in the left discard space found on the lower left side of the screen.  Next, click on the second card of the pair to be discarded.  If the sum of the two cards is equal to ten, the discards will disappear from the discard space and the playing board.  If the sum of the pair is not equal to ten, both cards will be placed back on the playing board and you will be notified of an illegal discard attempt.  Repeat the process until all possible pairs of ten are removed. (Remember that tens must be removed by themselves.)  When there are no more pairs of ten, click on the Done with Discards button.  Normal game play will resume at this point.  If you make a mistake in discarding, click on the GAME menu item and then click UNDO to reverse the most recent single or pair of discards.

Winning and Losing:

Playing and discarding proceeds until one of several things happens.

- The outside perimeter is filled with Jacks, Queens, and Kings.  YOU WIN!

- A face card is dealt, and there is no empty space for it.  YOU LOSE!

- The board is full, you start discard mode, and there are no discards.  YOU LOSE!

- You can't stand losing any more, so you click EXIT.

If you get really disgusted at continually losing and wonder what happens when you win, here's how to get a look at what a winner sees.  This is cheating by the way.

- Click HELP.

- When the drop down menu appears, click ABOUT.

- After you've read the important information, press and hold down the SHIFT key.

- While still pressing the SHIFT key, click OK.

Now a new game will automatically be started.  Play as usual, but you will win... and quickly!


Sample Screens


Technical Information

King's Corners was written in Microsoft Visual Basic using direct calls to WindowsAPI routines where appropriate for speed and less drain on system resources.  This program requires version 3.1 or higher of Microsoft Windows.  In order to run King's Corners, the following files are required:

VBRUN300.DLL 	Should be in your WINDOWS SYSTEM directory.  This run-time library file is provided by Microsoft and is distributed by publishers of Visual Basic programs.  If you already have a copy of this file, use the most recent version.

KINGCORN.EXE 	The King's Corners program itself.  Make sure that your program properties point to the directory where this file is located.

KINGCORN.INI 	This file tells the King's Corners program where the following files are located..  This INI file should be located in your WINDOWS directory.

KINGCORN.WAV 	This file contains the digitized sounds used by King's Corners.  A sound card such as a SoundBlaster  is required.  The location of this file should be specified in the KINGCORN.INI file.  This program utilizes the standard Microsoft Multimedia Control Interface for audio wave form.

KINGCORN.RLE 	This file contains the bit map of the playing card images used in the game.  The location of this file should be specified in KINGCORN.INI.

KINGCORN.HLP	This is the WINDOWS HELP file you are currently reading.  The location of this file should be specified in the KINGCORN.INI file.

KINGCORN.WRI 	This is the WINDOWS WRITE  game documentation.  This file is placed in your KINGCORN directory and may be deleted after it is printed.

INI Parameters:

The KINGCORN.INI file should be located in your WINDOWS directory.  It provides startup information for the program.  If the INI file is not found, or the parameter wanted is not  found, sounds may not  work and maybe the program won't run depending on what files cannot be found.  If the KINGCORN.INI file is not found, the program will search all directories in the DOS PATH  statement (found in your AUTOEXEC.BAT file) for its files.  The format of INI entries follows:

[KINGCORN]

Sound=0                    0: no soundcard,    1: soundcard

Suits=1                    0: Suits DISABLED,  1: Suits ENABLED

HelpPath=C:\yourpath       Default is your Windows directory

SoundPath=C:\yourpath      Default is your Windows directory

BitMap=C:\yourpath         Default is your Windows directory