Hearts: the trick-taking game where winning means losing
How hearts works: avoid tricks with hearts, dread the queen of spades, pass three cards and — if you dare — shoot the moon. From reversis to Windows.
Hearts is trick-taking turned inside out: every heart you capture costs a point, the queen of spades costs thirteen, and the winner is whoever best avoided winning. Its family tree runs from reversis (a courtly reverse game recorded in France in 1601 and fashionable in 18th-century Spain) to the American hearts of the 1880s, the Black Lady variant that armed the queen, the moon-shot (take all 26 penalty points and dump them on everyone else), and finally the Windows version that taught the world to fear the black queen. The pre-hand ritual of passing three cards to a rival is where games are won.
Our full guide (history, complete rules, passing strategy and moon-shooting) is in Spanish: Reglas de corazones. It plays best with a crisp deck from our playing cards collection.
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