iAppLover

Mahjong’s a classic game and one that has been brought to the iPhone with Moonlight Mahjong. Much like Solitaire, Mahjong has been a staple game packaged with most operating systems and has created fans around the world. Most people in fact, first found themselves face to face with this ancient game through Windows.

Mahjong in itself is a great game to play and Moonlight Mahjong brings that to the iPhone with intuitive controls and 3D. The objective remains consistent – take out all the tiles on the board by selecting identical pairs. The thing is, the legal tiles are tiles that you can slide out without disturbing or messing up any of the other tiles, much like Uno Stacko. Simple premise and yet, so very addictive. It’s what made it addictive years ago and it continues to be addictive now.

Improvements to the game make it more accessible to novices and people who’ve never even heard of the game before. Unlike Solitaire which can get frustrating because you’re not quite sure if you missed that one move that could have made it solvable, you can be sure that in Moonlight Mahjong that every puzzle can be solved. That of course does not mean that you can’t fail – oh yeah, you can fail. It’s just nice to know that the solution is somewhere out there. There are around a dozen tile layouts for you, Mahjong playgrounds that you can thoroughly test your eyes and fingers with.

Moonlight Mahjong takes full advantage of the iPhone’s capabilities, using both the touch screen and the accelerometer. These combined offer tremendous control over the puzzle. With your fingers, you can select the tiles and rotate the scene for a different view that could give you the solution. That, funnily enough, provides one of the few flaws present in Moonlight Mahjong.

As you are supposed to use your fingers instead of the stylus, it can predictably become difficult to select certain tiles. Some time will be used up just trying to pick the right tiles by spinning and turning the view until you can. Despite this issue, it remains an addictive and fun way to eat up a few hours. It’s a simple game that can fill up a nice afternoon or a quick break in work.

Moonlight Mahjong is definitely a good download for both old fans and people who’re looking for a new game because they’re tired of all the match three games running around. It’s a nice change of pace and one most people definitely won’t regret.