"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~"""~""" Shin 4 Nin Uchi Mahjong: Yakuman Tengoku (New 4 Player Strike Mahjong) FAQ NES 1991 Version: 1.0 released on the 1st of September 2007 Author: odino http://www.gamefaqs.com/features/recognition/47976.html This guide is EXCLUSIVELY available at GameFAQs. -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- TABLE OF CONTENTS =============================================================================== 01.) Introduction | G0100 | 02.) Basics | G0200 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 03.) Strategies | G0300 | 04.) Rules | G0400 | 05.) Scoring | G0500 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- YY.) Links | GYY00 | ZZ.) Credits & Thanks | GZZ00 | -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- =============================================================================== 01.) INTRODUCTION G0100 =============================================================================== This guide is about the popular Japanese version of the ancient board game, called "Reach Mahjong". It has many complex rules. If you know Mahjong from other nationalities or varieties, it is not simply easy to switch over to this version but it does help to know the basic things already. This is one of the best Mahjong games available for the NES and I strongly recommend you play this one if you cannot decide or don't know which one to play. It has a very good display, fine-tuned game system and fun playing modes. I think you will agree with me on this one. Give it a try! Some parts of the guide use Shift-JIS to represent Japanese characters in ASCII. To display them properly you may have to switch your brower's encoding manually. =============================================================================== 02.) BASICS G0200 =============================================================================== Most of the time you can read the commands in English, such as "Push A" or "Press START". When the game is "Saving", just wait a moment. When the main menu comes up, there are three options to choose from. The first mode is continuing with a character you saved before. The championship is a long, long game and you cannot finish it in one sitting. For the first two options you can pick between the playing the world tour or just picking your own opponents for a single game with chosen rules. The second mode is a new championship. You start out in Japan and travel the world once the rounds there are complete. Each tournament costs an entry and you need to keep a balance to survive. To unlock the next location one person must get over the specified amount (e.g. +50) or a specific win situation. A round lasts several games or until one person runs out of money, in other words is in the red. When one player is close to doing so, the advisor will pop up and mention it. The person with the highest points get + the amount compared to what the person with the lowest has. The same goes for the other two people in- between. Once the location's requirement has been reached, a winner is declared. Usually there are several rounds before the end result is reached. Then the payout is split accordingly. The loser is thrown out of the competition and you move on the next city where a new challenge will take the fourth seat. If you need more money for an entry fee then you can fly back to previous tournament locations. Location: Requirement: Tokyo 2 Wins Moscow +50 Paris 2 Wins New Delhi 2 Consecutive Wins Hong Kong 3 Wins Rio +80 Las Vegas 3 Wins When you are done with the world tour, you can replay the entire thing on a higher level. This is apparently a tougher competition but I haven't noticed much of a difference. I believe the extra rules could have been slightly tweaked to allow for some advanced scoring hands. The third mode is erasing data. Make sure you know what you are doing. Once its gone, it's gone. Between the games you can see the rules, the Top 4 players or End the mode. The number on the right is your current cash. During the game, press START to get the option menu. The top option views the current rules, the middle is for the background music (BGM) and finally you can turn autosave on and off. First you will need to learn the basics of how to play Mahjong - the board and tiles themselves. This can be done online, they are almost always the same descriptions. However, don't look into those Solitaire games (where you pick pairs from the board) as they include extra tiles not used be the original multiplayer game, such as the dragons and flowers. Here is a short run-down of the tiles. Note that these have an order, from either lower number or highest (and then back to 1) or the stated order of the Honor tiles. There are 4 of each tile which makes for 136 in total. Suits ````` Wan: From 1 to 9, they representes 10,000s each. Tong: From 1 to 9, they represent coins. Suo: From 1 to 9, the represent bamboo sticks. The first one is a bird instead, traditionally a chicken but most tiles don't show that. Honor ````` Winds: East - South - West - North; White - Green - Red. The honor tiles are said to have 'value', which always includes the three colors but only affects the wind directions according to the current round's wind and your own seat's wind. There are NO dragon pictures, NO flowers or any other fancy tiles in the game, these are made up for variations and the solitaire game. If you hear the terms dragon and flower used in the game then they will point to something else but to avoid confusion let's just ignore this for now. Next you have to get used to the board. It's just a table if you will, with one players sitting at one side each. You must have four players to begin. Of course in this game you only play against three computer opponents. There are 136 tiles and everyone gets 13. The rest is set up as a 'dead wall' where you draw with each turn. By taking one extra tile you total is 14, which is the amount required to finish your game. You only have this amount temporarily as you will discard another one at the end of your turn (unless you win in that turn). Before we begin, here is the display the game has to offer. The red tile is the round's wind. It is one of the directions, as the board is set up that each player is one direction. The dice decide who the dealer is, starting from the round's wind direction. The dealer is important for who starts the game and some extra scoring considerations. More on that in another section. The number next to that is the round you are in. There are often small sticks in the middle which represents dealer ante (tsumi). The four players are displayed on each side of the board. Press and hold the B button to move around the board to see more. You are at the bottom. The area above/next/below each player's row will be used for discarded tiles as you will soon see. Each player starts with 25,000 points. When you press UP you get a small mini-menu, but if there is nothing you can do at this point it simply shows how many tiles left until the round is forced to finish. If nobody has won by then, it is called a draw. You may have noticed one tile in the dead wall, three tiles from the left. This is called a Joker, or 'dora'. It is used for different purposes in different variations of the game. In the Japanese game, and this one, it is only useful for getting an extra score. However, do note that this just an indicator as in fact the NEXT one in line is the dora. You should know from the tile explanation, if the number is 1 Wan then the dora is actually 2 Wan. If the tile displays 9 wan then the dora is 1 wan and so on. For the honor tiles it also follows this way, going from the order of wind to the last 'zhong' and back to the winds. For example, a white tile would mean the dora is green. As I've mentioned before, this is just for scoring so ignore it if you do not care too much about that right now. So now let's actually get started in playing. With a player's turn, he or she takes a new tile from the dead wall. Your aim is to win the game by building melds out of the 14 tiles you have when it is your turn. Melds include several different forms: Pon: Three of the same tile, such as three East or three 2 Wan. (also called Pong in some variations) Kan: Four of the same tile, such as four East and four 2 Wan. You can build a Kan out of the three you have made already. In that case you will get to draw an extra new tile as bonus. (also called Kong in some variations) Shang: Three suited tiles in sequence, such as 1 Wan, 2 Wan, 3 Wan. (also called Chow in some variations) Pair: Two of the same tile, such as two East or two 2 Wan. (also called Jiang or Yan or Eye) The game automatically sorts your hand for the correct order. The newly drawn tile will be on the right side. If you decide to keep the new tile it re-sorts the list afterwards. To finish your turn you must discard one tile or declare you are the winner. Select the tile you want to discard with the LEFT or RIGHT directions and press A. If you have all your tiles making up for 4 melds and one Pair you have a winning hand and potentially are the winner. But not so fast! The game's mini-menu is displayed when you press UP. Here they are in ASCII as well. Use UP on the controller to get the selections to change but press DOWN to remove the menu without selecting anything. The terminology you must get used to are the following terms: Riichi: @ @ @@@@ @ @ @@@ @ @ @@ @ @ @ @ @ @@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@@@ @ @ @@ @ Self-Win - Tsumo: @ @ @ @@@@@@@@@ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ @@@@@@@@@ @ @ @ @ @ @ @@@@ @@@ Kan: @ @@@@ @@@@@@@ @ @ @ @@ @ @ @@ @ @ @@ @ @ @@ @@ @@ @@@ Ron: @@@@@@@@@ @@@@ @ @ @ @ @ @@ @ @ @@ @ @ @@ @ @ @@ @@@@@@@@@ @@@ Shang: @@@@ @@@ @@ @ @ @@@@@@@@@@ @@@@@@@@ @ @ Pon: @ @@@@ @ @ @ @@@@@@@@ @@ @ @@ @ @ @ @@ @ @ @ @@ @ @ @ @@@ Riichi: Call Riichi and discard a tile. Kan: Build a kan out of four tiles you have, or out of the three you already set aside in a Pon and want to add an additional one. Self-Win - Tsumo: For declaring you are the winner, if possible. Kan: Build a kan with this tile. Ron: Win by stealing with this tile. Shang: Build a shang with this tile. Pon: Build a Pon with this tile. Remember that these options are only available if you can actually do any of these. When a tile flashes you may steal it. If you decide to steal then it will be set aside on the right and shown to the other players. Do note that this means you miss out on a 'self-win'. You will know why in a second. For each steal the game asks which one you want to create. When you are offered to steal, there is a blue border around that tile and the game will wait until you make the appropriate choice from the mini- menu. Simply press A to not steal and draw a new tile. In more details. One way to win is to wait until you need one more tile and steal it from another player. In that case you do not declare a steal for a meld, but for a win which is called 'Ron'. You still build a meld, but this is for the last meld you need and therefore complete the entire hand. Another way to win is the declare a 'riichi' with the 2nd last tile you discard. You will bet 1000 and declare that you only need 1 more tile to win the game. At this point you can no longer discard any previous tiles. You can also see opponents betting on this quite often. The tile they throw away with the bet will have a purple line underneath. The game will automatically draw and discard the new tiles until you get one that wins the game as you are in a 'tenpai' state, which means "listening to tiles". You will then only need to declare a 'self-win' aka 'tsumo' once you get this tile. You can only Riichi when you have not declared any melds so far. Many players will try to retain from declaring melds to keep their winning hand options open and obviously not wanting to show other players their tiles. Let's say you have set aside melds already. Then you cannot Riichi any longer (unless ou made a Kan, it seems to be a special case). As you work on your tiles, eventually you will also end up at only requiring one just like when you would normally declare a Ron. At this point you may use Ron to steal the last tile to win the round if your hand allows it. See the rules for more details. The turns will continue until either one player wins, the game is declared a draw or you run out of tiles on the dead wall. Next up read the strategies to give you more on how to play better. To fully understand the hands you should read the rules and then you might want to check out how the scoring works. If a player lost all the money, it will go into the red and the round is over. Additional Rules...: (...you may want to know but only clutter the vital info.) If everyone discards the same tile at their first turn, the game is a draw. This happens more often than you think, as many throw away winds or other Honor tiles. After someone has stolen a tile, the play begins at that player, not the last person who discard the tile. This could mean skipping one or two turns for those players but it should even out over the course of the game. The small dealer ante sticks are used for additional scoring. The stick with a single dot in the middle represents 1,000 (10 times 100) where as the one with 8 small dots is a 100 stick. Should the dealer stay the same for more than one game, he bets 100 which is then shown there. The dealer gets 3x back for winning. It comes from the tile discarder if stolen or split from everybody when self-drawn. If a non-dealer wins, the dealer simply takes the bet back. If the game is drawn and another dealer takes over, the pot stays and moves on to the next person. =============================================================================== 03.) STRATEGIES G0300 =============================================================================== What you will see is that most players throw away the Honor tiles unless they already have two. You cannot steal to make a Pair, and these are very hard to collect. Play one round and you will notice everyone dumping Wind, White, Red and Green tiles all over the place. If somebody steals one to make a Pon or even Kan, that's pretty good, just doesn't happen often enough to hang on these. It is more feasible to collect suits. If you need to decide between which Honor tiles to discard, make your first choice the useless winds, as the colors and some certains winds are more valuable. For the suits, keep tiles that are close together. Let's say you have a 2, 4 and 8, dump the 8. It is very unlikely to turn into a meld. Similarly, if you have the choice between throwing away 4 and 9, throw the 9. 9 is what is called an edge tile as you can only use it for a Pon/Kan or a very unlikely Shang with 7 and 8. Like counting cards, counting tiles is great too. If you keep track of what others discard you will be able to calculate how many of one tile are still available to be discarded or drawn from the dead wall. 14 tiles make for 7 pairs. This is a special method to win. You will most likely attempt this if you start out with many pairs. It isn't as uncommon to see and likely achieve at that point. Note that you cannot have four of a kind and call them 2 pairs each, they must be unique. If you have a sequence of 3, 5, 6, then do not bother keeping the 3 around. 5 and 6 have higher chances to complete the sequence and if you get 4, then 3 isn't necessary anyway. Even with these basic strategies you should be winning rounds. However, to really be good at the game you must learn the rules of how the hands are being won. Remember that you need 'value' for a winning hand. =============================================================================== 04.) RULES G0400 =============================================================================== These are not the game rules, but what kind of hands can be made to win the round. As the game ends the scoring screen will show the score multipliers called 'fan' the winner has achieved. These are the most commonly used rule sets in Riichi-Mahjong: Name: Name of the hand, either closely or loosely translated. Fan: How many extra multiplier are added for this hand. O/C: Open (steals are allowed) or Closed (no steals allowed or possible) Description: Details about the hand, any specific rules or variations. o-----------------------------------------------------------------------------o | Name: | Fan | O/C | Description: | |--------------+-----+-----+--------------------------------------------------| | Riichi | 1 | C | When you only require one more tile after | | 立直 | | | discarding the next one, you are ready to wait | | | | | for the win. Until then you cannot do anything | | | | | but discard the new tile unless a kan possible | | | | | that doesn't change your required tile. | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Win 1 round | 1 | C | Once you declar Riichi, win at the next turn | | after Riichi | | | without anyone creating melds. | | 一発 | | | | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Strong | 1 | C | Win without stealing nor opening your hand. | | Self-Win | | | | | 門前自摸 | | | | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Simple Melds | 1 | O | Only using suit tiles from 2 to 8, thus no 1s, | | 断ヤオ九 | | | 9s or Honor tiles. | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Peace | 1 | C | 4 Shang and one pair that does not have value. | | 平和 | | | | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Double Shang | 1 | C | 2 Shang that are identical, e.g. 2, 3, 4 Wan | | 一盃口 | | | twice. | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Last Draw | 1 | O | Win on the final draw. | | 海底摸月 | | | | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Last Discard | 1 | O | Win on the final discard. | | 河底撈魚 | | | | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Kan-Win | 1 | O | Win by creating a Kan by stealing the tile. | | 槍槓 | | | | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Kan-Bonus-Win| 1 | O | Win with the tile you receive after creating a | | 嶺上開花 | | | Kan. | |=============================================================================| | 3-Color Shang| 1 | O | 3 Shang that are identical in three different | | 三色同順 | 2 | C | suits. | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Straight | 1 | O | 3 Shang using 1 suit from 1 to 9, i.e. 1->3, | | 一気通かん | 2 | C | 4->6, 7->9. | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Mixed Edge | 1 | O | Each meld has either a 1, 9 or Honor tile. | | 全帯 | 2 | C | | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Terminals | 1 | O | Melds consisting of Pons, Kans and a Pair where | | 混老頭 | 2 | C | each one is either 1s, 9s or Honor tiles. | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Double Riichi| 2 | C | Declare Riichi with your first turn. No-one else | | ダブルリーチ | | | must have stolen so far. | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 7 Pairs | 2 | C | 14 tiles make for 7 pairs. You cannot steal for | | 七対子 | | | obvious reasons. | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | All Melds | 2 | O | Only melds and a pair. | | 対々和 | | | | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Three Melds | 2 | O/C | 3 melds that aren't open (stolen), the rest of | | 三暗刻 | | | the hand may be stolen, eg the 4th meld. | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Three Same- | 2 | O | Three meld that each contain at least one of the | | Number Melds | | | same number. | | 三色同刻 | | | | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 3 Kan | 2 | O | 3 Kans declared. | | 三槓子 | | | | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | 3 Little Elem| 2 | O | 2 Pons and and 1 Pair of Honor tiles. | | ?ｬ三元 | | | | |=============================================================================| | Mixed Flush | 2 | O | Only one style suit and honor tiles are used. | | 混一色 | 3 | C | | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Pure Edge | 2 | O | Each meld has either a 1 or 9 tile. | | 純全帯ヤオ九 | 3 | C | | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Double 2 | 3 | C | 2 times two Shang that are identical, e.g. 2, 3, | | Shang | | | 4 Wan twice and 6, 7 8 Wan twice. | | 二盃口 | | | | |=============================================================================| | Pure Flush | 5 | O | Only one style suit. | | 清一色 | 6 | C | | |=============================================================================| | Dora | +1 | O | The dora indicator is on the dead wall. For any | | ドラ | | | tile you have you get +1. There are extra dora | | カンドラ | | | tiles as you make Kans and when you win with a | | 裏ドラ・カン裏ドラ | | Riichi. | |-----------------------------------------------------------------------------| | Honor Meld | +1 | O | A set of Honor tiles such as three White, Red or | | | | | Green, the current round's wind or the player's | | | | | own wind direction. +1 for each meld. | o-----------------------------------------------------------------------------o There are more special hands that may not be included in the game. Not every game will uses all of these. Think of this as super-advanced class if you really want to know these rules: 4 Triples: C Four Pons and a Pair. 四暗?? Pairless Country: C A 1 and 9 of each suit, each one of the Honor tile ?綜m無双 and then one extra tile to make a Pair. 3 Large Elements: O A meld of White, Green and Red. 大三元 Large/Small Wind: O A meld of each wind, one may be a Pair only. 大四喜?E?ｬ四喜 All Green: O Using Suo (Bamboo) 2, 3, 4, 6, 8 and Green Honor 緑一?F tile. May REQUIRE using the Green Honor tile even. All Honor: O Using only Honor tiles. 字一?F Nine Treasures: C One suit with 1112345678999 and one extra tile for 九蓮宝燈 making a Pair. Pure Edge: O Only 1s and 9s. ?ｴ老頭 4 Kans: O Four Kans declared. 四槓子 Heaven Win: C The dealer instantly has a winning hand. 天和 Earth Win: C The non-dealer has an instant winning hand at the 地和 first turn without anyone stealing before it. =============================================================================== 05.) SCORING G0500 =============================================================================== There is a complex way to calculate the final score. Luckily the game does everything for you, but if you are still interested then read the next section in great detail. Base: ````` First, a tally value is calculated based on the composition of the hand and how the hand was won. This number will be an integer between 20 and 70. To get the tally, take 20 as base. Add 10 points if won by a steal, or 2 points if drawn. Additional points are awarded for pairs. 2 for each value Honor tile and 4 if the wind is both round and player's. For each Pon, 8 points if closed end, 4 if open end or closed middle and 2 if open middle. For a Kan, 32 points if closed at the end, 16 open end or closed middle and 8 for open middle. Finally, there are 2 points for the tile you were waiting if it was in the middle of a Shang, on the side of a Shang if there was only one way to complete it (Edge, like 1, 2 and waiting for 3) and third if it completed a Pon. Two exceptions to this case is '7 Pairs' which automatically results in 25 as tally. 'Pinfu' gives a tally of 30 if won on a steal, and 20 if self-drawn. Multiplier: ``````````` The multipliers can be seen in the previous section. Each one adds a certain amount of points to the sub-total. You get 2 extra as base amount which sums up to the total multiplier. Final Score: ```````````` Take the base number and round it up to the nearest multiple of 10 unless the hand was a '7 Pairs'. Multiple this number by 2^Multiplier for a sub-total. It cannot be higher than 2000 points or else it is reduced to said amount. That is the limit in the game to avoid huge scores in single games. If the win was self-drawn, each loser has to pay that sub-total. Else, multiply the sub-total by 6 if the dealer won, multiply it by 4 if a non-dealer won. As the win was won on a steal, only the person discarding the winning tile has to pay this larger amount. Draws: `````` There are several ways to draw the game: - No more tiles are left to draw. - All players discard the same wind tile in the first round. - There are four Kans declared in total. You may complete with a 4-Kan hand. - All four players have declared Riichi. - Three players are waiting for the same tile to be discarded. - A player has 9 different tiles of 1s 9s and Honor. That player may choose to declare a draw. If the game ends after all tiles have been drawn, each player's cards are opened. Players only needing one tile to win will receive money from the others. In case of just one player he gets 1,000 from all the others. If there are two ready players, the other two have to pay 1,500 to each of the two read players. If there are three ready players, the only one left must pay 1,000 to each player. =============================================================================== YY.) LINKS GYY00 =============================================================================== A few sites that helped me find information regarding the game's mechanics, rules and other things I needed to confirm. WikiPedia's Mahjong Article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mahjong Japanese Mahjong Scoring: http://ofb.net/~whuang/ugcs/gp/mahjong/mahjong.html Mah Jong - Modern Japanese Rules: http://www.delfosse.com/mahjong.html Reach-Mahjong Rules: http://reachmahjong.com/en/rules.html =============================================================================== ZZ.) CREDITS & THANKS GZZ00 =============================================================================== This guide was derived from odino's '4 Nin Uchi Mahjong' guide with permission. GameFAQs for hosting this file. Nintendo for the game. All those websites listed in the previous section, I'm sure I used them all to find something or another. To either learn about the game or just to confirm a rule. All trademarks and copyrights contained in this document are owned by their respective trademark and copyright holders. This guide may be not be reproduced under any circumstances except for personal, private use. It may not be placed on any web site or otherwise distributed publicly without advance written permission. Use of this guide on any other web site or as a part of any public display is strictly prohibited, and a violation of copyright. ,,, (o o) -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=oOOo-(_)-oOOo-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=