Canasta

I really liked this app at first. The ads were reasonable and well placed, and increasing the AI difficulty made the game more fun and realistic. I'm trying to learn to play in real life. Later, though, the AI began making some very odd discards, followed by stretches where the hands felt unusually one-sided and unrealistic. It became no longer educational or fun and I uninstalled. I’m going to reinstall and give it another try. I'll update this after several games.

Online help or optional pop-up suggestions would be great for newbies or first-time onliners. New phone, new version. Still great. Only problem is, it's purely addictive. Edit 8.17.26: with the last upgrade, it has become increasingly impossible to win. My point margin has gone from approx +300 to +204 in a few short months with no noticeable decline in my ability. No longer fun. I'm out.

The algorithm has room for improvement. The built-in strategy gets in the way of logical plays that a human would make in certain circumstances. It's frustrating when you have a run of six on the board, your partner has two in their hand, but won't play one to complete the canasta...even if it's the first one needed in order to go out. That's just one example. Human partners interact differently than the algorithm allows.