Play Selective Castle Solitaire Online for Free (No Signup Required)

Beleaguered Castle with a twist: the first card you play sets the rank every foundation must open with. One deck, medium difficulty, and a tight 15% win rate reward patience.

Selective Castle Solitaire takes Beleaguered Castle Solitaire and drops its fixed foundation rank: whichever card you play first sets the starting rank for all four foundations, and every other pile has to open with that same rank, each in its own suit, before it can build upward. Add eight tableau piles where only the exposed top card ever moves, and you get a tighter, more thoughtful puzzle than the original. It's medium difficulty, played with a single deck, with a 15% win rate, so reading the board matters more than luck.

Chessboard Solitaire is another solitaire game worth trying if you like this one.

If you run into anything odd or have an idea that would make the game better, please contact me.

Have fun!

How to play Selective Castle Solitaire

Layout:

4 foundation piles: Build up in suit from the rank of the first card played to any of them, wrapping from King to Ace if needed, until each pile holds 13 cards.

8 tableau piles: Construct down in any suit, wrapping from King to Ace as needed. Only the top card of each pile is playable. Any available card may be used to fill any open space. At the start of the game, the first four piles receive seven cards face-up, while the following four piles receive six cards.

Foundation:

There are four foundation piles.

Any card may be the first to be moved to an empty foundation pile. Once that happens, every other foundation pile must also open with a card of that same rank, each in its own suit, before it can build upward.

A card can be added to a foundation pile only if it's one rank higher and the same suit as the pile's current top card, so the only card that fits on a J of diamonds is a Q of diamonds.

The top card of each foundation can be moved back into play if another pile will accept it.

Tableau:

There are eight tableau piles of cards, with the first four each having seven cards and the next four each having six cards. Every card is dealt face-up.

A card can be added to a tableau pile only if it's one rank lower than the pile's current top card and of any suit, so the card that fits on an eight is a seven of any suit.

Cards on the tableau that are not covered by another card are free to be played onto the foundation or any other tableau pile.

Any card can fill an empty slot in the tableau.