Contract bridge: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contract_bridge

Bridge is quite complicated compared to other card games and this discourages most of the people who might consider it as a hobby.

This project aims to introduce anyone new to the game of bridge from the first moments.

Scenario:

Our visitor, lets call her Vangel, enters our web page. Vangel has no prior experience of how bridge is actually played but she is definitely curious to learn. There she is sitting South as a declarer of a 3 No Trump contract watching the 13 cards she has been dealt with. The Opening Lead, the Ace of Spades is played by the defender on her left; sitting West. Then, Dummy sitting North, automatically lays down his 13 cards to public view. All Vangel has to do is choose (by clicking) one of Dummy's 3 spades (7, 5, 3) to continue with the game. Then the other defender, sitting East, plays the 4 of spades. Now Vangel has to play a spade from her hand (Queen, Jack, Ten, 9). So Trick 1 is won by West which now starts the second trick with the 2 of Spades. Again Vangel, plays another spade from Dummy, East follows with the 8 and Vangel wins this trick with any of her -higher than the 8- spades (Queen, Jack, Ten, 9). Then its Vangel's turn to play any card from her hand to start trick 3.

In this - less than a minute - experience the user learns the following:

• the flow of the play is clockwise (gets a note when he clicks on his cards instead of Dummy's after West's play).
• you must follow suit (gets a note when he clicked on a Heart, Diamond or Club, instead of a Spade, that started the trick)
• the Highest Ranking card wins a trick, and the rank of cards is higher to lower (Ace, King, Queen, Jack, Ten, 9, down to 2)
• the player who wins the trick will lead the next trick.

Helpful notes are displayed as reactions, to any illegal -by the rules of the game- move. Additionally small hints and tips are displayed discretely around the page.

If this scenario sounded to complicated and you skipped reading everything after the reference to the Opening Lead, imagine how easier this would all sound with a visual and interactive representation.

There are many articles, books, software and online communities aimed to attract a begginer wanting to learn bridge. All of them though start with the rules, requiring effort, money, time (or even downloads and logins) that will eventually pay off if -ofcourse- our begginer sticks around long enough.

What this project aims to accomplish is to lure the candidate bridge player, letting him start his bridge learing experience with just that what all games are made for:

P L A Y

All other rules and parts of the game can patiently wait to being learned as Vangel gets more into it. Even if she never made it to trick 3, she still might be telling her friends that she once played Bridge!

A random quote found on the internet regarding Contract Bridge: "It looked so complicated to me that I didn't do more than glance at it! I think you have to read an entire rule book just to play the game!"