Where’s my Minesweeper?

QI’ve played Minesweeper from Windows XP onwards, but it seems to have disappeared from Windows 10. I looked on Microsoft’s website and found it for downloading, which I did. But this version looks very different, and I hate it. Is there a way to get the original version back, without actually buying a second-hand PC?

AThe original Minesweeper and old favourites such as the card game Solitaire were dropped from Windows 10. Microsoft created new versions and made them available free from the Windows Store (at www.snipca. com/25018), as you discovered.

We’re not exactly sure what’s happened in your case, but we assume you installed Windows 10 over XP on your old PC, or that you bought a new Windows 10 PC. Either way, Minesweeper won’t be there.

If you’ve retained your old XP computer it’s possible to copy the old games across and force them to work by hacking their code. However, this is hard work. It is far easier to visit www.snipca. com/24963, as someone has already done the tricky code modifications and turned the game into a free download. Click the ‘Download Windows 7 games for Windows 10’ link (avoiding any misleading adverts – see screenshot), then right-click the downloaded ZIP file and choose Extract All to expand the contents. Now just double-click the ‘Windows 7 Games for Windows 10 and 8.exe’ file and follow the prompts to select and install the titles you want.