Search icon

Tech

23rd Jan 2017

Here’s something you almost definitely did not know about Solitaire

Did you know this?

Laura Holland

Did you know this?

Long before Angry Birds and Pokemon Go, the only digital games you could play were on your PC.  If you were lucky enough to have a computer at home you could happily spend hours playing simple games like Solitaire and Minesweeper.

It also made computer lessons in school that bit more enjoyable.

But did you know that there is a lot more to the games than we thought? In fact, they weren’t intended to be there for our entertainment at all.

They were purely created to help people to adapt to the use of the computers.

According to The Mirror, the oldest of the games, Solitaire, was added to Windows 3.0 in 1990 to teach ‘mouse-fluency’. It was used to teach people how to drag and drop items on their computer.

Minesweeper was then introduced to Windows 3.1 in 1992 and aimed to teach people how to use the left and right buttons on a mouse. The game helped with speed and accuracy when left and right clicking.

 

Hearts also had an ulterior motive attached to it, and that was to encourage people to communicate with others online. It was like an early form of chat room by the sounds of it.

Topics:

Tech,Windows