Hearts program cheats! I've specifically caught the game cheating. Passed Ace & King Spades to the right & they ended up across the table. I think this is BULL I would expect a program to play by the rules!

@wendyjoyce - Wow!  I have never seen anything so blatant in this game.  It must be bad programming; no way they would think such a thing would not be noticed by the players.  Were you winning by a large margin when that happened?

As i said earlier it's not just Spades but all the games that come pre-installed with Windows, i was playing internet Spades and had bid 0 only having one spade in my hand the 3 and yet somehow got caught but thought nothing of it then a few games later i was in same position only this time i counted the number of spades played and realized there should have still been another 2 spades on the last hand yet NONE got played!!!!!

As for Hearts i must be some sort of idiot for trying to give it another go, anyway resetting the scores after every game seems to offer some sort of balance; but then what is the point of having records other than the computer keeping track to cheat accordingly?

@wendyjoyce - Wow!  I have never seen anything so blatant in this game.  It must be bad programming; no way they would think such a thing would not be noticed by the players.  Were you winning by a large margin when that happened?

I like playing Hearts so have overlooked the predicable and frequent program-rigs in the game...until today.    

I had the lead and was holding a lot of spades...and led with a spade to flush out the queen.

To my surprise, north, east and west threw out diamonds.

I paused, wondering how I could have missed the queen having been played.

Regardless, I led again with a spade, and like before, all players responded with diamonds.

I did it a third time and received two diamonds and a heart.

On my FOURTH spade led, East played the Queen.

I was stunned.

That's beyond the pale of cheating.

That's BAD, BAD programming.

I think you have missed some of the points that I tried to make.

Some people have studied this MSHearts program extensively complete with record-keeping that proves that the cards are not dealt randomly.  Those numbers only confirm what many of us casual players have suspected since our first exposure with Windows 3.1.

You say you can get to 57% and then you lose heavily for a while.  I suggest you take a closer look at the games you lose and ask yourself "why?"  Was it poor play on your part?  Probably not.  The answer is that when your win rate gets to a certain point the program will select hand apportions that will make you lose.  If you played with the cards face-up you would see this clearly.  Some hands are simply not playable as was the case with the example I cited in my comment.  On the other hand, the program will give you games that are easy to win when you have lost enough.

I wonder how many games you have played with real people and real cards because experienced players like myself know for certain that the pre-determined patterns in MSHearts are indeed "consistent" and very much "out of the ordinary".   My first reaction nearly 20 years ago when I first played MSHearts was "it doesn't play like people play".  

As for your last paragraph, I think you missed the point.  People dump games because they don't like having 40 points after only two hands.  They don't like winning the Queen of Spades with a 3 on the first time around for a suit.  People dump when otherworldly stuff happens.  The win percentage is not the point.  No one goes around bragging about being 47-0.  I know that score is a cheat.  But the game cheats too.  The purpose of manipulating a high win ratio is to be able to see how the program will react.  The higher your wining rate, the more the game will cheat with fixed deals.

Dumping is about being able to play a complete game without having your intelligence insulted.  My record is 17 dumped games in a row.  Others have reported higher numbers.

MSHearts is not alone.  The Hoyle version is worse in some ways.  I have read that the version of Hearts played on a Mac is just as bad.  I have tried other on-line versions of Hearts and they all produce fixed "deals".  The first time I pass the Queen Spades and get the A-K passed to me in return I am out.  Do you play Spades?  The Hoyle version of Spades has you snookered by simply never, ever letting you bid nil.  There's always something large in your hand that you could not slough off.

For more insight into this I recommend you do a search for Mrs B's.  You can read more than 1500 comments from people and they have cataloged many more things than what I listed.