Grand Mahjong

The layout in Grand Mahjong is a pyramid, and clearing it is a question of order rather than of eyesight. Identical tiles pair off and vanish, but as with any stack of this kind the pieces you can actually lift are the ones nothing is resting on. The tower-tips guide takes the same rules apart step by step.

Take a pair from the top course early and you expose two more beneath it. Take the wrong pair at the base and the tile that matched it can spend the rest of the level trapped under three others, which turns a comfortable board into a hunt for the one legal move left. Black and White Mahjong 2 piles the tiles into a different silhouette.

GameBerry Studio runs it as a ladder built on traditional Chinese tiles: the pyramid comes back with more to it and tighter matches as the levels go on, so the opening boards read as a warm-up and the later ones punish a careless first ten moves. The frame is 800 by 600, with mouse or fingertip both accepted. At Home – Xmas Edition builds the layers into another arrangement.

1. Look at the pyramid from the top down and find the tiles nothing is stacked on.
2. Pair two identical free tiles to remove them and expose the course below.
3. Keep the pyramid even rather than digging one shaft into it.
4. Clear every tile to finish the level and move up the ladder.

• Work the summit — tiles at the peak of the pyramid unlock the most beneath them per pair removed.
• Do not tunnel — a deep hole in one corner leaves the rest of the courses pinned exactly where they were.
• Read the base early — the bottom course is where a stranded match becomes permanent.
• Expect the squeeze — later Grand Mahjong levels leave fewer free tiles at any moment, so plan two pairs ahead rather than one.