Elite Mahjong

Elite Mahjong opens on a difficulty menu rather than a board: easy, medium and hard are chosen before a single tile is lifted, and the arrangement you are handed changes with the choice.

A tile comes off only when nothing is stacked on it and one of its long sides, left or right, is clear. The long-side wording matters on these denser layouts, because plenty of pieces that look reachable from above are pinned on both flanks and will not move. A second stacked layout here is Solitaire Mahjong Classic.

A hint and a shuffle are both on hand. The hint points out a pair that is currently live, the shuffle rearranges whatever is still standing when no pair exists at all. Underneath, a timer runs and feeds the score, so the gap between a solved board and a good board is how long you spent staring at it. Xmas Mahjong Tiles 2023 keeps the layered board and changes the shape.

The original is a 2004 Flash release, and what plays here is that file under the Ruffle emulator instead of the plug-in it was built for. The difficulty menu is where that shows first: its buttons sometimes want a firm second click, the removal sound can trail the tiles by a beat, and full screen comes from the browser rather than from any control inside the game. The Glow Jong board asks the same question of a taller pile.

1. Pick easy, medium or hard on the opening menu before the deal.
2. Scan the upper layer for a tile with nothing above it and a free left or right edge.
3. Click its twin elsewhere on the stack to lift the pair.
4. Call the shuffle when no legal pair remains, and the hint when you simply cannot see one.
5. Clear every tile to finish, keeping the clock in mind since it feeds the final score.

• Try easy once — the setting changes the shape of the stack, not only the tile count, and knowing that shape helps on hard.
• Read the long sides — a piece blocked left and right stays locked however clear the top of it looks.
• Spend the shuffle late — it is worth most when a dozen tiles remain and the board has genuinely stalled.
• Switch to full screen — the 2004 artwork is small, and the suit dots on the lower layers are hard to separate in a window.
• Do not dawdle over easy pairs — the timer is part of the score, so obvious early matches should be quick ones.