First and best in Sierra's underrated series of computerized parlor games based on the most popular anthology book of the same name, Hoyle Official Book of Games features six popular care games: crazy eights, old maid, hearts, gin rummy, cribbage, klondike.
What sets the game apart from other card games are the excellent graphics, intuitive mouse-based user interface, and-- best of all-- the ability to choose popular Sierra game characters as your opponents. Each card game comes complete with well-written on-line rules that can be called up at any time during game.
Opponents you can choose to play against are classified as 9 "not-so-serious," and 9 "serious" players. Clicking on their portraits yields a brief introduction, along with games they are good at. Although these are the same 18 opponents for all card games, the fact that you only play against 1-3 of them at a time keep the replay value high.
One of the best features of the game is the conversation you will hear among the opponents, as well as between them and you, the player. This is most fun coming from opponents who are characters from famous Sierra games e.g. King's Quest and Space Quest. King Graham, for instance, will brag about his adventures in Daventry, Roger Wilco will dreadfully recall his tasks as a galactic janitor, and Sonny Bonds will share anecdotes about police life. They will even bicker among themselves depending on how well they know the other people!
The "not-so-serious" players (which most Sierra characters are) will also give you gentle hints and nudges when you spend a long time thinking, or make an invalid move. You can also turn off their incessant chatter once it begins to get on your nerves. These opponents are also well-animated, and you can use their facial expressions as signals of how well they are doing. It is entertaining to watch Princess Rosella grimace after getting a bad hand, and that grumpy Colonel Henry (from Colonel's Bequest) grit his teeth and concede defeat after losing badly :)
Overall, Hoyle Official Book of Games is a great collection of card games that may not boast the best AI, but is very user-friendly and enjoyable. Highly recommended, especially for fans of Sierra adventure games and card game beginners. Experts, however, may want to skip this one and play QQP's Bridge Olympiad instead. Thumbs up!
Review By HOTUD
English 
Comments and reviews
Agree with poster below, by far the best Hoyle game. I played this on an ancient PC from December-1989 (an 8086 8mhz upgraded to 512KB).
Hilarious part, it was still faster on that PC than the Amiga version I later played in 1991.
Hoyle Card Game 2012, is one game that is fixed so the human, ( you ), never wins at spades, always computer characters, never the human who bought the game, Honesty is priceless
am looking for Bridge Game like Hoyle used to offer
This is far better than the later Hoyle games. Loads of charm and replayability. The later games with better graphics lost a lot of the appeal and are more sterile.
Or just run it through ScummVM.
Because you require DOSBox to emulate DOS before you can play, it's madness to expect a 30 year old game to run on a modern PC and frankly dangerous to even try - that's how tears in spacetime are formed!
Unfortunately, I cannot install the program because I have the 64-bit version of Win 7 and apparently, there is not 64-bit version available. Dang...I was really looking forward to being able to play a childhood favorite like this one. The browser version doesn't seem to work either.
I love this. Playing cards with Larry, the Colonel, and Sonny Bonds all at once is surreal.
I've read through the abandonware guide but I'm still having problems installing... I'm on a Mac using Boxer. I go through the install process but when I try to launch the game I get a message that says "Couldn't install video driver." Any suggestions?
My personal favorite Sierra/Hoyle game =)
OMG! I finally found this game! I played it on my grandmothers computer when I was a little girl! So nostalgic!
Nice game, but why did they put a moustache on Sonny Bonds? Sonny never had a moustache. Keith did, but not Sonny.
No comment nor review for this game at the moment.