# Mahjongg Manual

## Introduction

Mahjongg is a solitaire (one player) version of the classic Eastern tile game, Mahjongg. It has all the functionality you expect from a tile or card game. You can change the type of tiles, the background, and the difficulty level, among other things, in the Preferences dialog. Other features, like the Pause button, make the game more competitive when you play against the clock.

### A Brief History of Mahjongg

Mahjongg tile sets are used to play many variations of the original game. The version of Mahjongg you play is the solitaire one. Each tile also has a meaning associated with it.

Mahjongg's origins are not fully known, but many theories have been put forth. One such theory says that Noah played Mahjongg on the ark because the East hand is dominant, presumably the direction the rains came, in the flood. Another theory says that the Chinese philosopher, Confucius, made the game. The three Cardinal tiles have the same names as his three Cardinal virtues, Chung (middle) the Red, Fa (prosperity) the Green, and Po (white) the White, corresponding with Benevolence, Sincerity, and Filial Piety. Still another theory says that Mahjongg is derived from other Chinese games. Ya Pei is played with 32 cards made of wood or ivory and have the same oblong shape as present day Mahjongg tiles. Ma Tiae is played with 40 paper cards, similar in appearance, numbering 1 to 9 in four different suits along with the flower cards. It has been suggested that two brothers made the game, around 1850 A.D., from a combination of these two games.

In the early 1900s Mahjongg was introduced into English clubs in Shanghai. Mr. Babcock started the importation of Mahjongg tiles to the Western world. He stripped down the rules to the very basics and even put Arabic numerals on the tiles. 1923 was the height of the Mahjongg craze with major gaming companies, like Parker Bros., Milton Bradley, and United States Playing Card, importing Mahjongg tile sets by the thousands.

Many different rules sprang up and in 1924 the Standardisation Committee of the American Official Laws of Mah-Jongg was formed to write a rule book. Still today many clubs play by different rules and sometimes even add flower or joker tiles. Players of the computer version are becoming intrigued with the beauty and detail of the hand crafted sets of the 1920s and 1930s and are searching antique shops and flea markets for sets of their own. Many new players are being introduced to the game solely through the solitaire version and are slowly realising the intrigue and challenge that the traditional game offers.

Portions of this text were adapted from the Mah Jong Museum.

## Playing Mahjongg

You start with five levels of tiles which are stacked so some are covered up by the tiles on top. The harder the level you set in the Preferences dialog, the more tiles are covered when the game starts. The object of Mahjongg is to remove all the tiles from the game. To remove tiles you have to find matching pairs which look alike. A matching tile will usually have the same number of buttons or markings on it or will look similar to each other.

As an example, the highlighted tile, in the figure below, has six buttons. The matching tile is the one which also has six buttons. The tile is on the right-hand end of the third row from the bottom and there is another near the top of the fourth row from the bottom. If you want to match the tile on the top level, you need to look for the tile with the same green bamboo symbols. Do you see a matching tile yet? There are three tiles, which are visible, that match the tile on the top level. Two are to the left and the lower right. The third one is on the top row, but you can't remove that tile yet because the tile isn't on the outside of the stack of tiles. Later you will learn which tiles can be removed and which tiles can't be removed even though they match. Find the other two matching tiles, which are visible, on your own.

### Mahjongg's Main Window

Main window.

Mahjongg is played by clicking on two matching tiles that are then removed. Play continues until all the tiles are removed or there are no available pairs.

Only tiles at the far left and right edges on each level can be selected. This is because you can't remove any tiles which aren't at the far left and far right sides. If the tiles are on a different level and at the left or right sides, those can be removed when you find another matching tile.

If you can't match any more tiles, a dialog will appear telling you no more tiles can be matched and giving you the option of shuffling the tiles (adding an additional 60 seconds penalty to the game clock), starting a new game or undoing your last move (although you may have to undo many more moves to find your mistake).

### Information Dialogue

Information Dialogue.

### Toolbar

The toolbar, located below the Menu Bar, contains the following buttons:

New

- This button starts a new game with the current settings.

Restart

- This button restarts the current game to the beginning without shuffling the tiles.

Pause

- This button pauses the game. When the game is paused the clock, at the bottom-right corner of the Main Window, stops and you cannot see any of the tiles' faces.

Undo Move

- This button replaces two tiles you removed until you reach the beginning of the game.

Redo Move

- This button replays your previous move, the Undo Move button took back.

Hint

- This button gives you a pair of matching tiles to remove. Each time you use it, 30 seconds penalty will be added to the game clock.

The status bar at the bottom of the window gives you information on the current state of the game:

Tiles Left:

- This shows the number of tiles remaining to be matched.

Moves Left:

- This shows the number of possible matches you can make.

Time:

- This shows the elapsed time from game start.

#### Mahjongg's Toolbar

Toolbar.

### Menus

The menu bar, located at the top of the Main Window, contains the following menus:

Game

- The menu contains:

  - Ctrl-N New — This item starts a new game.

  - Restart — This item resets the current game to the start.

  - Pause — This pauses the game, stopping the clock and hiding the tiles.

  - Ctrl-Z Undo move — This item takes back two tiles you removed until you reach the beginning of the game.

  - Ctrl-R Redo move — This item replays your previous move the Undo button took back. When you reach the state you started undoing the message No more redo! appears at the bottom left corner of the Main Window.

  - Hint — This item gives you a pair of matching tiles to remove.

  - Scores — This item brings up a dialogue showing you the ten best scores. The dialogue has the scores identified by username and the time it took to complete the game.

  - Ctrl-Q Quit — This item allows you to quit the game.

Settings

- The menu contains:

  - F11 Fullscreen — This item allows to play the game in fullscreen mode. To leave fullscreen press F11 or click Leave Fullscreen button on toolbar.

  - Toolbar — This item determines whether the toolbar is shown. If the item is checked, the toolbar is shown in the last place you put it. If the item is unchecked, the toolbar is not shown.

  - Preferences — This item brings up the Preferences dialogue.

Help

- The menu contains:

  - F1 Contents — This item shows this manual.

  - About — This item gives you some basic information about GNOME Mahjongg, such as the authors' names and the application version number.

## Customisation

To change the application's settings, select Preferences from the Settings menu. This opens the Preferences dialogue.

### Preferences Dialogue

Preferences dialogue.

All the options are applied and saved immediately.

The properties in the Preferences dialogue are:

- Tile Set: — Select the look of the tiles from this list.

- Select Map: — Change the difficulty of the game by altering how the tiles are stacked. The more spread out (easy) version lets you see more of the tiles while the more compact (hard) version does not let you see many tiles.

- Background Colour: — Change the colour of the background by bringing up a colour picker to let you select a new colour.

To alter the size of the tiles simply resize the window in the normal way. The tiles will expand to fill it.

## Authors

Mahjongg was written by Francisco Bustamante (pancho@nuclecu.unam.mx), Michael Meeks (mmeeks@gnu.org), Max Watson, Heinz Hempe, and Philippe Chavin. Tiles for Mahjongg were made by Jonathan Buzzard and Max Watson. This manual was written by Eric Baudais (baudais@okstate.edu). To report a bug or make a suggestion regarding this application or this manual, follow the directions in this document.

## Licence

This program and tile artwork is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public Licence as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the Licence, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public Licence for more details.

A copy of the GNU General Public Licence is included as an appendix to the GNOME Users Guide. You may also obtain a copy of the GNU General Public Licence from the Free Software Foundation by visiting their Web site or by writing to

     Free Software Foundation, Inc. 51 Franklin Street, Fifth FloorBoston, MA02110-1301USA