One of the oldest ancestors of FreeCell is Eight Off. In the June 1968 edition of
Scientific American Martin Gardner described in his "Mathematical Games" column, a game by C. L. Baker
that is similar to FreeCell, except that cards on the tableau are built by suit instead of by alternate
colors. This variant is now called Baker's Game.
Paul Alfille changed Baker's Game by making cards build according to alternate colors, thus creating
FreeCell. He implemented the first computerized version of it for the PLATO educational computer system
in 1978. The game became popular mainly due to Jim Horne, who learned the game from the PLATO system and
implemented the game as a full graphical version for Windows. This was eventually bundled along with
several releases of Windows.
- Shuffle, then deal the 52 cards face up in 8 columns with each card visible but only the end card
of each column fully exposed. Four columns will have 7 cards, the others only 6.
- Apart from the columns, there are four single card free cells and four suit piles
(foundations). The objective is to get all the cards into the foundations.
- Single exposed cards may be moved:
- Column to column, placing the card on a card of the next rank and different colour
suit. (E.G. Place a red 3 on a black 4.) (Aces are low.). Empty columns may be filled with any
suit or rank.
- Column to FreeCell, any exposed card as long as there is an empty cell.
- FreeCell to Column, as column to column.
- Column to suit home pile. Next card in order, starting with the Ace, ending with the
King. Each suit is completely independent.
- FreeCell to suit home pile. As column to suit home pile.
To improve the game play, multiple cards may be dragged at once as long as there are enough empty
FreeCells such that the move could be made by moving the cards individually.
