By Cary Farrier
seahaven@farriersoft.com
Copyright ©1994-2000 Farrier Software. All Rights Reserved.
Seahaven Towers 3.1 for Microsoft Windows is "Charity Ware." This means that it is not free; if you enjoy playing this game, you must purchase it by donating $10.00 to a local charitable organization. The full version of Seahaven is in your hands right now, it is up to you to decide to send in the donation.
You are free to copy this game, give it to friends, upload it to online services, etc. I encourage this! There are absolutely no restrictions on the redistribution of this game.
The goal of Seahaven Towers is to rearrange the cards into the four suits, and move them up to the home spaces in the order Ace, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, Jack, Queen, and finally King.
Along the way, the game will help you out by automatically moving cards to the home spaces as they become available. Until you register and receive a password, the game will only move cards Ace through 6 for you. Once you register, all of the cards will be moved for you.
There are four home spaces, two in the upper left corner and two in the upper right corner of the game window. The goal of the game is to move all of the cards to these spaces in the correct order.
At the top-center of your window are four move spaces. You can place a single card in each space for temporary holding while you are playing the game. But be warned! Once you move a card into one of these spaces, you can only move it back down if you place it on the correct card, which brings us to...
This sounds hard at first, but don't worry! You'll get the hang of it pretty fast. The game will tell you why a move could not be made if you keep an eye on the status bar at the bottom of the application window.
You can move from one to five cards at a time, but here's the catch: the cards you are moving must all be in order, and there must be enough empty move spaces. "Enough" empty move spaces means that to move five cards at one time, you need to have four empty move spaces. To move four cards, you must have three empty move spaces, and so on. To move only one card, you don't need to have any empty move spaces.
When placing cards, you can only place a card on top of it's next higher card in the suit, i.e. a 9 of clubs can only be placed on the 10 of clubs. The exception to this is that when you are moving a King, you can place it in an empty area of the playing field.
As a matter of fact, what you want to do is clear up one of the columns of cards (so that it is empty), and then move a King there so you can begin building your suits in the correct order.
Seahaven Towers for Microsoft Windows has a number of features.
Game Numbers. Every game has a game number, and you can tell your friends a game number so that they can play the same games as you, and you can play games they tell you about.
Autoplay. Cards that can be moved to the home spaces will be automatically moved for you. Autoplay will often catch moves that are easily missed, and removes the tedium of having to move every card by hand. This feature can be toggled on/off.
Undo/Redo. You can undo your moves all the way back to the start of the game, and then redo your moves back to where your game is currently at. At any point in using undo/redo, you can decide to continue playing the game at the current position. This feature is a real life saver, I doubt many people could win a game without it.
Sound Effects. Unique sound effects for many of the game actions. For those of you who don't find them entertaining, they can be toggled on/off.
Different Card Backs. You can choose your card back from a number of selections. Keep an eye on the Seahaven card back, it will change depending on the time of day that you start the game!
Status Bar. The status bar at the bottom of the window will tell you why a move could not be made. This is very helpful when you are learning to play the game.
Scoring History. The history of your wins and losses is kept for you, as are the percentages of the number of games won/lost. You can clear your score history when things start to look too bad.
Multiple Games at One Time. You can play more than one game at a time. This is great for when you are sharing the game with someone else, or when you want to put aside a really tough game for a while.
Two Sizes of Card Decks. There are two card decks available, one for smaller screens and one for larger screens. The large card deck can only be used in resolutions of 800x600 or above.
File
New Game (Random Deck)
This will cause a new game to be created, and the deck will be shuffled at random. The new game will have a game number in the title bar of its window, so if you want to tell someone else about this particular game you can.
New Game (by Number)
Brings up a window asking you for the number of a game you wish to play. If someone wants to share a good game number with you, this is how you play that game.
Abort this Game
Aborts the current game. This will add a loss to your score history!
Start Game Over
Starts the current game over.
Show Score History
Clear Score History
These items do exactly as you would expect.
Edit
Undo Move
Redo Move
Undo and Redo your moves!
Options
Auto Play
Toggles the Auto Play game feature. Only turn this off if you are a pro!
Auto Play Animation
Turns off the animation of cards during autoplay, good for slower computers.
Sound
Turns sound on/off.
Won Games
Keep Until Exit
Keeps games you have won open until you exit the program, at which time they will be removed. This is useful if you would like to study your moves after you have won.
Auto Close
Get rid of the game as soon as you beat it!
Close and Begin New
This one is for the hardcore users: close the game you just won, and open a new one right away! The action never stops!
Small Deck
Large Deck
Choose between using the small deck or the large deck.
Select Card Back
Seahaven Traditional 1
Traditional 2
Marbles
Bubbles
Choose the card back. Keep an eye on the Seahaven card back, it will change depending on the time of day you start the game!
You should always try to get your Aces to the home spaces as soon as possible.
Don't build up a big sequence (i.e. more than 4 or 5) of cards in a column because you won't be able to move them without enough empty move spaces. If you build up a sequence of 6 or more cards, you will never be able to move them!
Use undo/redo. Sometimes you can back your way out of a dead-end situation.
Many of my users have complained that this game is addictive, and should be regulated by the DEA (the American Drug Enforcement Agency)! I have found it to be just as addictive, and I have known one person that managed to win over 700 games in a row, although that was accomplished by a "feature" in the Macintosh version that I consider cheating.
I can't take credit for inventing Seahaven Towers, I'm just another addict. I became addicted to the Macintosh version written by Art Cabral around 1988, and that is why I eventually wrote this version for Microsoft Windows. Now, though, it seems that I may have cured my addiction to the game by writing it.
My version of Seahaven Towers has been featured in the San Jose Mercury News (June 5, 1994), and on the Windows User Magazine (United Kingdom) Cover Disk (December, 1994). Click to find out about other versions of Seahaven Towers.
Macintosh
The original version of Seahaven Towers was written by Art Cabral, of Longwood Associates. This version is available just about everywhere, and you can contact Art Cabral and Longwood Associates at the following address:
Longwood Associates
P.O. Box 2162
Sunnyvale, CA 94087
OS/2
In addition to the Macintosh and Windows versions of Seahaven Towers, there is also a version available for OS/2 users written by J. Daniel Kulp. You can reach Daniel Kulp by the following means:
J. Daniel Kulp
24 Roseland Street
Dorchester, MA 02124
email: jdkulp@ibm.net (preferred)
CompuServe ID: 75052,1436