Pinochle Classic 4+

I have been enjoying this app for a week now. Fun game. Fast play. Overall great game. However, on Pro I think some updates need to be made. There are moves that would NEVER happen in a real game. Like the players bidding on a hand and picking trump without an Ace or 10! Leading off with a 10 not trump would never happen in a real game. And holding on to a random 10 which is a counter and passing a 9 to your partner. In Pro the app should be a little closer to real play. You always clean the counters out of your hand and hold noncounters of an off suit if you have to hold anything. Also, the computer players play their losers too soon. There isn’t really a difference between beginner and pro on this app and it’s frustrating to someone who actually knows how to play.

Great app. After my first review I think the developer made some changes. The difficulty level is pretty much the same, but it feels like the way the cards are dealt has improved. I have never gotten a double run, triple pinochle, or any high melding hands for some time now. That adds another dimension of difficulty that I enjoy because anybody can play a strong hand and make their bid. There are some things that are allowed in the app that aren’t allowed in traditional pinochle. You have to have a marriage to even take a bid or you are set, but the app allows you to without a marriage. Also, you have to have at least 20 meld to take a bid or you’re set unless the bid is mathematically unreachable which usually takes real life discretion, but the app automatically makes you throw it in sometimes. I have hands in real life that seemed unreachable, but because of the way my hand was sitting I was able to win nearly every trick. Also, you should have the option to not play a hand if you know that you can easily make the bid.

The app is very well designed.

I wish there was a pay version (say, $4) that incorporated four things that would be easy to implement:

(1) Remove the ads

(2) An “auto-play hand” button that uses the “standard” AI to play your cards. Players could use this button when playing the rest of their hand isn’t important. (For example, when the game’s outcome has already been decided. Another example is when your partner has called trump and you’ve already played all your counters. Another example is when you want to focus on comparing different bidding strategies and auto-playing the hand would allow you to do that quickly.)

(3) Allow the player to adjust the partner’s bidding aggression. When the opponents are close to winning, we should bid aggressively, like a “Hail Mary pass.” When we’re close to winning, we should be more conservative to avoid negative points from a failed contract.

(4) Add a few additional stats. For example, the Win % over the last 10 games and last 50 games. These two stats would keep interest in the stats, even after the overall Win % has stabilized with lots of games. (Yes, the player could just reset the stats to do that, but with a reset you lose all records of what you’ve already accomplished.)

Wouldn’t a $4 version give you *far* more revenue than you get by playing an ad after each hand?