Outlaw - TriPeaks Review

Solitaire is an often quite soothing, relaxing game to play, which explains why it's consistently popular across many formats. Outlaw-TriPeaks is certainly pretty simple to play, but awkwardly, it still feels in need of some instruction and tightening up.

Set in the Wild West, players must compete against a series of opponents in order to, presumably, become the greatest Solitaire player in all the West. This bit is pretty simple. The screen is filled with cards, set in a Pyramid style format, and the player must tap on cards that directly correlate to the one on the top of their pile, by either going up or down. It's standard stuff. Annoyingly, the animations can be a little sluggish, especially at the start, where time is lost waiting for the game to catch up, but otherwise, it's easy enough. Jokers ensure there's a way of getting ahead, so it's rarely particularly challenging.

What's confusing, though, is how to progress to the next opponent. There's little feedback on what needs to be done, even in the help section of the app. In the end, I figured it out through realising I had to collect 360 stars by playing the first stage numerous times, in order to go onto the next stage. It wasn't overly intuitive, though, and it did take a while!

Besides gaining stars for high scores, more can be acquired by shooting down the Ace of Spades. This is in a mini-game after initially finishing the card side of things. Cards fly up the screen and the player must shoot down the Ace of Spades, while avoiding all others. It's a brief but slightly needless addition to a game that would have been fine with just regular card playing.

It'll certainly take a while to unlock all the opponents in Outlaw-TriPeaks, but I didn't feel a huge urge to persevere. With no extra unlockables or anything else to gain, it pales in comparison to other Solitaire games, feeling like a brief but forgettable alternative.