You described the basic gameplay of mahjong accurately. While it is nigh impossible that *literally* nobody uses the Chinese "Official" Rules as set forth by the PRC State Sports Commission as seen in the booklet you used in the video, nobody plays according to those rules. In overseas Chinese communities, most use some version of the Hong Kong Rules, which use a geometric scoring system with significantly fewer scoring elements rather than the arithmetic one in the Chinese Official rules. Some use the Hong Kong "New Style" or Shanghai rules which do use such arithmetic system (and upon which the Chinese Official rules are based) but have fewer (and less arbitrary) scoring elements. While the Chinese Official rules booklet is the ruleset that comes in mahjong sets sold by Yellow Mountain Imports (such as the set you used in the video), many mahjong sets that can be bought in the various American Chinatowns usually come with a pink or orange booklet that lays out the so-called "Chinese Classical" rules, which were the ones that American businessman Joseph Babcock learned when he discovered Mahjong back in the early 20th Century while working in China on behalf of his employer, Standard Oil. Nobody plays with these rules, although the lineage can be seen in Japanese Mahjong and the very niche, but charming, British Mah-Jong Association rules. Internationally, the most popular, or at least the most organized (i.e. there are professional leagues and amateur organizations out there that hold tournaments) version played in Japanese Riichi Mahjong. A free copy of the rules in English can be obtained from the website of the European Mahjong Association. There is also an excellent guide to Riichi Mahjong floating around out there authored by some guy named "Barticle" who wrote it to help people playing the Yakuza series of video games play the mahjong minigame included therein. For those living in the Nashville, TN area, I encourage them to join the Franklin Riichi Mahjong Meetup group that I organize and feel free to explore the resources available in a Dropbox that I have linked in Discussion section of the Meetup group's page. In the U.S. I believe that the most popular form of mahjong is "American" Mah Jongg. The rules are maintained by the National Mah Jongg Association, which publishes and sells an annually-changing rules card listing scoring combinations to be used during the year. Amongst other rules, American Mahjong employs a larger set that includes 8 joker tiles to be used as wild cards, and it allows for sets that are larger than three (or 4 in the case of Kongs) tiles (largely due to the existence of these wild tiles). This is the "Jewish Mahjong" that the character June mentions in the film "The Joy Luck Club" based upon Amy Tan's novel of the same title.
Thanks! Mahjong is one of those games I have in my "to learn" list. You're making it easy 😄 Now looking at it, it's actually somewhat similar to Si-Se-Pai. I have a Mahjong card set, but I'm planning to buy one of the fancy Chinese sets in the future, but the large ones (40mm or larger) are quite expensive!
Agreed they're really wonderful to own, but not worth the expense if you don't play regularly. You just can't beat the sound and feel of the real ones though.
I am just astonished that you are more familiar with Si Se Pai than Mahjong. Where I come from, the latter is significantly more common than the former. In fact, the only person I have never met in real life who even knew what Si Se Pai were is my mother, who vaguely remembered seeing the sorts of people her parents warned her against hanging around with using them when she was her child (although, the cards might have actually been zipai or dongguan pai rather than si se pai).
@@hanng1242That’s because I’m a Designer, and like playing cards a lot, and Si Se Pai are actually very peculiar, so I investigated about the game and learned the rules. I even designed a deck, since getting a deck here in Spain is quite difficult. It’s a neat game. I hope to order one of my decks from a manufacturer and play with friends and family. 😊
gee, cant wait for the 1 hr Riichi Mahjong tutorial with everything including Yaku, Furiten, Pao, and the Scoring and how awful it is One important thing to say if you are going to do a Riichi Mahjong Tutorial: When you win off of a discard you say "Ron", not "Ron-nya." You’ll get dozens of stares if you go to a parlor saying that.
@@hanng1242 awful as in the scoring, the game is amazing, but the scoring is my least favorite part. There are many parts that I feel are just completely unnecessary to the scoring (Fu, in fact some parlors say screw it and make every hand 30 fu because even though your Fu can go up to 110 I think, most hands are 20, 25, 30, or 40 Fu) or completely unbalanced (Sankantsu, which despite being rarer than Yakuman hands, is worth only 2 Han) And then, there's the table. Yes, you can technically have a sheet of paper that has the table on it and use that or just use an app that calculates the score for you, people go out of their way to memorize the table so they don't need to pull out a piece of paper or their phone every hand. And yes, I realize how bad this argument is now that I've typed it but hey, I still love Riichi Mahjong and play it every weekday during lunch
@@DatMathBoi Hey! How can you hate Fu? Shouldn't a formula of Fu x 2^(2+Han) appeal to somebody named "DatMathBoi?" 😜 Of course, the easiest solution is to just win big. Hit 5 Han, and nobody has to worry about Fu. Just employ your Mahjong 洪荒之力 like they do in the manga "Saki."
In Rummy and Mahjong, players can only form sets and runs using their own cards / tiles. But in Tongits, players can put their own cards in sequences of sets / runs formed by their opponents. Bad thing is, Tongits requires more space, and a bigger table would be needed
Do you have an online website or any game on the store, you recommend to practice the game rules? The google play store is horrible and shows that crap solitaire tile matching version for some reason.
Heh "netherpotal" love it!
It took me all these years to find an easy mahjong introduction.
Great video, thanks!
You described the basic gameplay of mahjong accurately.
While it is nigh impossible that *literally* nobody uses the Chinese "Official" Rules as set forth by the PRC State Sports Commission as seen in the booklet you used in the video, nobody plays according to those rules. In overseas Chinese communities, most use some version of the Hong Kong Rules, which use a geometric scoring system with significantly fewer scoring elements rather than the arithmetic one in the Chinese Official rules. Some use the Hong Kong "New Style" or Shanghai rules which do use such arithmetic system (and upon which the Chinese Official rules are based) but have fewer (and less arbitrary) scoring elements. While the Chinese Official rules booklet is the ruleset that comes in mahjong sets sold by Yellow Mountain Imports (such as the set you used in the video), many mahjong sets that can be bought in the various American Chinatowns usually come with a pink or orange booklet that lays out the so-called "Chinese Classical" rules, which were the ones that American businessman Joseph Babcock learned when he discovered Mahjong back in the early 20th Century while working in China on behalf of his employer, Standard Oil. Nobody plays with these rules, although the lineage can be seen in Japanese Mahjong and the very niche, but charming, British Mah-Jong Association rules.
Internationally, the most popular, or at least the most organized (i.e. there are professional leagues and amateur organizations out there that hold tournaments) version played in Japanese Riichi Mahjong. A free copy of the rules in English can be obtained from the website of the European Mahjong Association. There is also an excellent guide to Riichi Mahjong floating around out there authored by some guy named "Barticle" who wrote it to help people playing the Yakuza series of video games play the mahjong minigame included therein. For those living in the Nashville, TN area, I encourage them to join the Franklin Riichi Mahjong Meetup group that I organize and feel free to explore the resources available in a Dropbox that I have linked in Discussion section of the Meetup group's page.
In the U.S. I believe that the most popular form of mahjong is "American" Mah Jongg. The rules are maintained by the National Mah Jongg Association, which publishes and sells an annually-changing rules card listing scoring combinations to be used during the year. Amongst other rules, American Mahjong employs a larger set that includes 8 joker tiles to be used as wild cards, and it allows for sets that are larger than three (or 4 in the case of Kongs) tiles (largely due to the existence of these wild tiles). This is the "Jewish Mahjong" that the character June mentions in the film "The Joy Luck Club" based upon Amy Tan's novel of the same title.
Wow great info, thanks!
Nether portal - this man is a gamer!
Thank you ! This is amazing! You explain things so clearly, it makes getting started so much easier! Keep up the great content!
Thank you! Will do!
WOOOW, bravo Chris! Mahjong is one of my favourite games! 🏆
Thank you!
Amazing video, amazing edit. You never disappoint
Thanks a ton!
Thanks! Mahjong is one of those games I have in my "to learn" list. You're making it easy 😄 Now looking at it, it's actually somewhat similar to Si-Se-Pai. I have a Mahjong card set, but I'm planning to buy one of the fancy Chinese sets in the future, but the large ones (40mm or larger) are quite expensive!
Agreed they're really wonderful to own, but not worth the expense if you don't play regularly. You just can't beat the sound and feel of the real ones though.
I am just astonished that you are more familiar with Si Se Pai than Mahjong. Where I come from, the latter is significantly more common than the former. In fact, the only person I have never met in real life who even knew what Si Se Pai were is my mother, who vaguely remembered seeing the sorts of people her parents warned her against hanging around with using them when she was her child (although, the cards might have actually been zipai or dongguan pai rather than si se pai).
@@hanng1242That’s because I’m a Designer, and like playing cards a lot, and Si Se Pai are actually very peculiar, so I investigated about the game and learned the rules. I even designed a deck, since getting a deck here in Spain is quite difficult. It’s a neat game. I hope to order one of my decks from a manufacturer and play with friends and family. 😊
awesome! always wanted to learn how to play mahjong
This will at least get you started, the next level is beyond my abilities!
Thank you for posting this.
You're Welcome!
gee, cant wait for the 1 hr Riichi Mahjong tutorial with everything including Yaku, Furiten, Pao, and the Scoring and how awful it is
One important thing to say if you are going to do a Riichi Mahjong Tutorial: When you win off of a discard you say "Ron", not "Ron-nya." You’ll get dozens of stares if you go to a parlor saying that.
lol, not this this life!
What do you mean awful? From a gameplay standpoint, Riichi Mahjong is the best variant extant if rewarding skill is the most important criterion.
@@hanng1242ok now I’m intrigued. I’ll have to give it a shot.
@@hanng1242 awful as in the scoring, the game is amazing, but the scoring is my least favorite part. There are many parts that I feel are just completely unnecessary to the scoring (Fu, in fact some parlors say screw it and make every hand 30 fu because even though your Fu can go up to 110 I think, most hands are 20, 25, 30, or 40 Fu) or completely unbalanced (Sankantsu, which despite being rarer than Yakuman hands, is worth only 2 Han)
And then, there's the table. Yes, you can technically have a sheet of paper that has the table on it and use that or just use an app that calculates the score for you, people go out of their way to memorize the table so they don't need to pull out a piece of paper or their phone every hand.
And yes, I realize how bad this argument is now that I've typed it but hey, I still love Riichi Mahjong and play it every weekday during lunch
@@DatMathBoi Hey! How can you hate Fu? Shouldn't a formula of Fu x 2^(2+Han) appeal to somebody named "DatMathBoi?" 😜
Of course, the easiest solution is to just win big. Hit 5 Han, and nobody has to worry about Fu. Just employ your Mahjong 洪荒之力 like they do in the manga "Saki."
In Rummy and Mahjong, players can only form sets and runs using their own cards / tiles. But in Tongits, players can put their own cards in sequences of sets / runs formed by their opponents. Bad thing is, Tongits requires more space, and a bigger table would be needed
Do you have an online website or any game on the store, you recommend to practice the game rules? The google play store is horrible and shows that crap solitaire tile matching version for some reason.
Most popular at the moment is Majong Soul. It's a japanese variant called Riichi. It has more rules.
You're right, there are shockingly few. I've played one called Mahjong 13 titles that was fairly decent.
Can you teach me how to actually get lucky in Mahjong? No, amount of memorizing winning hands can help me. XD
Easy, just make sure you’re born in the year of the dragon and then you’ll be all set 😂