Ever since seeing The Ring in high school, I’ve always loved fiction about cursed media. There’s something truly haunting about the idea that just interacting with a work could somehow condemn you in horrific ways you could never dream of. It’s made even more tantalizing when that piece of media is something that’s been considered lost to time, making it all the more tempting to try to figure out what makes it so infamous.

Forbidden Solitaire, a co-production between Home Safety Hotline devs Night Signal Entertainment and Shadowhand creators Grey Alien Games, takes this idea and puts you in the shoes of a player who recently came across a CD-ROM of the titular controversial game, a 90s game that might have rightfully earned its controversy.

Right off the bat, you’re presented with a fake desktop login screen where you sign in as Will Roberta, a clever reference to Phantasmagoria creator Roberta Williams. You get some messages from your sister Emily that explain the setup: at a thrift store, you’ve purchased a copy of Forbidden Solitaire, a game from the mid-90s that you remember seeing ads for but never got around to playing. As you launch the CD-ROM, you find a low-fi adventure game that leads you through the Forbidden Dungeon, on a quest for whatever secrets lie within.

Two Stories, One Game: Emily’s Investigation Sends Players Into Nostaglic FMV Territory

This makes for a great dual-narrative story. The in-game quest is an atmospheric, clichéd-in-a-fun-way dungeon delve filled with strange locations and even stranger monsters. There’s an almost dreamlike vibe to its progression, following weird video game logic in a way that reflects the style of the times it’s emulating. At certain points, Emily will interrupt the game with messages that pop up on your screen, sending you news articles and videos as she researches why Forbidden Solitaire was so hard to come by. Both plotlines get more and more sinister as they go along, slowly beginning to intersect as it creeps towards its conclusion.

Neither of the stories is particularly surprising, but the presentation absolutely sells it. The crunchy 3D models look exactly like they would have been cutting edge in 1995, making for a delightfully surreal, retro nightmare. Even more fun is the content that Emily sends you, including crime scene photos, old game ads, and full motion video news segments. I’m such a huge sucker for FMV content in games, and they pull it off perfectly. All the acting is surprisingly good, particularly the sections that focus on the behind-the-scenes drama around the creation of the game. It was fun to see Strange Scaffold founder Xalavier Nelson Jr in such a prominent role in this, especially after enjoying his acting work in El Paso Elsewhere.

You never really make choices about how you navigate through the dungeon, so your main mode of gameplay is a clever little card game. Anytime you come to a point of conflict in the game, whether it’s fighting a horrible creature or trying to unlock a door, you resolve it by playing a variant of solitaire. Strewn about the screen are various piles of cards, sometimes with strange statuses on them that change how they play.

Each turn, you flip over a new card from your deck, and you’re trying to find a card on top of these piles that’s either one up or one down in value. You continue to chain cards until you have to flip over another one and repeat the process. If your deck runs out, it’s game over, and you’ll have to start that encounter again. Clear all the cards on the screen, and you’ll proceed to the next part of the story. It’s not exactly the traditional solitaire that I played on my 90s PCs, but it’s easy enough to understand and layered with twists to the formula.

A Unique Twist on Classic Solitaire Gameplay

The most common twist is when you are in battle against a creature, changing the combo aspect into a crucial aspect of the fight. The longer the combo, the more damage you’ll do that turn. Even though your opponent doesn’t play cards, they will have a turn that’s telegraphed, so the other layer of execution is making sure that you can mitigate whatever they are trying to do. As you flip cards from your deck, you’ll build up mana, which can be used for various advantageous moves that can shift the tide of battle. Mixed in among the card piles are bonuses that grant things like temporary armor, extra mana, and even armor-piercing damage to your opponent.

My favorite variant of the formula was reserved for when you’re sneaking past monsters in the dungeon. During these encounters, there’s a cone of awareness over some of the cards that moves each turn. Grab a card that’s in the cone, the cone turns red. Grab a card in the red cone, it’s a game over. It’s a great combination of narrative and mechanics, simulating the feeling of trying to do your task right under the nose of something that’s trying to kill you. They weren’t exactly scary, but they did simulate tension in ways that few other sections of gameplay could.

There’s some interesting decision making you need to do regarding these cards that add some nuance to the play. For example, you may have a large pile of cards with an armor card on top, and while it would be nice to grab that one so you can start working through the cards under it, it might be better to save it until a turn where the enemy is attacking.

Even more strategy is required when you have different statuses applied to cards. Sometimes they are locked until you play a certain number of cards in a suit; other times they explode when you play them, doing damage to you. It’s never anything overwhelming, but these twists mostly keep things fresh as you do one battle after another.

Forbidden Solitaire didn’t strike me as a game where you unlock upgrades, but there’s a surprisingly robust system that involves buying gems from an eye in the wall and jamming them into your increasingly bloodied hand. Gems will give you special abilities like being able to undo a play, reshuffle the card piles, or sometimes just change the odds of drawing the card you need. The merchant also allows you to purchase jokers that can be added to play, each with a different special ability. These will appear either in your deck or among the card piles, and they are always helpful in saving a potentially bad hand.

Currency for the shop is earned during play, generally through clearing piles or getting combos, but it always felt like I had plenty of money without even trying. By the end, I was able to purchase everything, which, on one hand, is nice to feel that power curve, but on the other hand, I would like to be forced to make some meaningful choices about what I want to focus on rather than be funneled towards one inevitable final build.

Does Forbidden Solitaire Overstay Its Welcome?

While all these upgrades and jokers definitely add a certain amount of strategy to the card game, it did sometimes feel like I got certain rounds where I just didn’t win through little fault of my own (though probably some fault). In the end, there’s only so much you can do to solitaire to make it more interesting, but the game pushes the concept farther than I anticipated.

There were definitely encounters in the middle of the game where I was effectively using new powers are recently acquired jokers in ways that made me pump my fist in satisfaction, but it felt a bit like the gameplay ran out of new ideas about two thirds of the way through the game’s six hour story, making the big boss fights near the end feel a bit more like a test of patience than skill. As the game progressed, it went from feeling excited to play the solitaire encounters to just trying to get through them so I could see whatever neat bit of narrative was up next.

Despite the mechanical complaints, Forbidden Solitaire charmed me with its dedication to the retro style, creating a holistic product that truly felt like cursed lost media. Both sides of the dual narrative provided equal amounts of fun, swapping between the two of them at a perfect pace. The six-hour story may have stretched the gameplay a bit thin, but the fun I had with the narrative made any friction feel worth it.

With a little editing and a few more surprises, in both gameplay and narrative, it feels like this could have been an absolute cult classic, but as it stands, it’s a spooky throwback that’s a bit more style than substance.

Review code provided by publisher. Forbidden Solitaire is available now on PC via on Steam and GOG.com.