Free Downloads for Mike’s Cards

This site features downloadable decks I have created for Mike’s Cards, the greatest shareware collection of card games for Mac OS and Windows. The current version of the shareware program is 2.1 (Mac version works with both PowerPC and Intel Macs); the freeware Mike’s Cards Lite is also available. I am grateful to Mike Sedore for granting me a free registration code for the software after I upgraded from Mac OS 9 to OS X. Mike’s Cards is different from other programs of its kind in that you can create new solitaire games or modify existing games using the built-in game editor. At present, my JPEG card face files are for Mac only, because I don’t know how to batch-convert file names to something Windows computers will understand. These are free downloads, but you must be a registered user of Mike’s Cards. You need StuffIt Expander to decompress these files. I hope that when Mr. Sedore releases the next version of Mike’s Cards, it includes a drag-and-drop deck editor like that supplied with Wiz Solitaire.	Thematic sets of card face images. Try to be creative with the aces, jacks, queens and kings!	One- and two-deck games created with the game editor.
	Card backs, background images and custom suit symbols.	System 7 sound files for game events: card flip, card move, game lose, game win, shuffle.

I also invite other users of Mike’s Cards to share the decks they have created (either by scanning actual decks or through other means), as well as background images, sound effects and even new solitaire games made with the game editor. Card faces and backs should be approximately 140 pixels wide by 200 pixels high, but the program will scale them as needed. Corner indexes should fit into a space 24 pixels wide by 56 pixels high, so if you scan your own pictures for card faces, keep the corners as close to white as possible. Card backs and jokers are optional but recommended for completeness. Important: If you specify rank and suit in your card face filenames (e.g., 10C for 10 of clubs or QD for queen of diamonds), you must define all 52 card faces. If your card face folder contains fewer than 52 images, the program will assign random images to the undefined card faces. For example, you cannot create just custom aces and court cards, expecting the program to use the default deuces through 10s. Maybe a future version of Mike’s Cards will accept partly customized card face sets, especially with the addition of pictures on the jacks, queens and kings in the default deck. As of version 1.8.1, the program properly inverts the card index in the lower right corner.

Sounds must be in System 7 [SFIL] format. Images may be in JPEG, TIFF, PICT or Adobe Photoshop formats; QuickTime movies will play as card backs, but only the poster frame will be used for backgrounds and card faces. If you scan a deck you own, be sure to get permission from the playing card manufacturer before distributing the scanned images!

Advisory: One of my decks contains generic non-sexual images of nude humans.