Mahjong Magic Islands

Rainbow Games hangs a rescue story on ordinary solitaire. The Magic Islands have lost the wild energy that kept their ancient cities beautiful, mythical creatures scattered across them are waiting for help, and you are cast as the one who can put it back — a framing that gives each cleared layout somewhere to go. The guide to working a base answers the questions this board raises.

Underneath the story the rules are the classic ones: matched pairs of free tiles, taken until the stack is gone. What Rainbow Games claims as its own is the look — a visual format built for the island setting rather than the usual bamboo-and-character set. The Jolly Jong pile uses the matching rule on a differently drawn set.

It is drawn at 800 by 600, the usual canvas for a stacked layout, and the build runs on a touchscreen as well as on a desktop. For one more pile of the same kind, see Mahjong Mahjong.

1. Take on an island layout and find two identical tiles with a free side.
2. Match them to remove both and expose the tiles they were resting on.
3. Clear the whole stack to finish that step of the restoration.
4. Move on through the scattered islands, each with its own arrangement to break down.

• Learn the island art — Rainbow Games replaces the standard suits, so the first few boards are spent teaching your eye which creature is which.
• Clear the covers first — a tile with something resting on it cannot move, whatever the story says about urgency.
• Keep count of quadruples — when all four copies of one symbol are free, take the pair that opens the deeper tier.
• Read the story as pacing — the restoration is doled out in board-sized pieces, so short sessions fit it better than marathons.